


Tumblr Prompt Ficlets

by fedzgurl



Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Civil War, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Alternate Universe - Pizza Place, Break Up, Breaking Up & Making Up, Bucky Barnes Recovering, Bucky Barnes Remembers, M/M, Meet-Cute, Pining, Post-Serum Steve Rogers, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Protective Bucky Barnes, Wedding Fluff, animal abuse mentioned, food accommodation as a means of flirtation, rescue animals, seriously so fluffy it's embarrassing, unabashaed fluff
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-27
Updated: 2017-02-19
Packaged: 2018-04-28 10:29:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 26,418
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5087239
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fedzgurl/pseuds/fedzgurl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Short, un-beta'd ficlets from tumblr prompts, ratings/pairings/characters to change as they are added as I try to get back into the swing of writing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Requested by @biblionerd07 on tumblr: Steve/Bucky. 72. “I will knock you on your ass if you even think about it.”
> 
> I would say that I'm sorry for this fluffy garbage, but it would be a lie...

“I will knock you on our ass if you even think about it,” Steve murmured, his face deceptively sweet for the camera but his eyes narrowed and flitting between the mischievous smirk growing on Bucky’s face and the slice of cake he’d lifted gingerly into his right hand.

Bucky widened his eyes, his face a picture of shocked innocence as he reacted to Steve’s words.  Never mind that he had obviously been growing restless over the wait, after having posed for at least a dozen photographs and videos and God knows what other methods of recording Stark had up his sleeve that had lead to the simple act of cutting a damned cake lasting eight minutes.  He’d grumbled about dying of old age under his breath, earning him a quick and bemused glance from Steve, but secretly he had to admit to himself that he was grateful to know the night would be so well-preserved.  While his memories had by and large recovered in the years since he’d been able to break free of Hydra, there was still a part of Bucky that couldn’t help fearing that all of this would be taken away from him: not just Steve and the team and the frankly unbelievable amount of happiness that had somehow befallen him, but all of the memories of them as well.  So really, he wasn’t _that_ bothered by the fact that the friends they had surrounded themselves with had taken it upon themselves to over-document every moment of their big day.

He still wanted them to hurry up with the flarkin’ cake, though.

The unfortunate bit was that as a result Bucky was left frustrated and a little bored, which of course got his mind working, which had led to him remembering Stark’s comments about how messy the cake-feeding bit of wedding receptions could be and how affronted Steve had seemed by it, which had started giving Bucky _ideas_.  And apparently, getting married to the fella you’d been in love with for literally a century also conferred mind-reading capabilities, because Steve had seen right through Bucky’s plan the moment he’d come up with it, and now was looking down at him with a frankly ridiculous amount of righteous indignation, given Bucky hadn’t even _done_ anything yet.

In that moment, feeling both up to no good and so full of love for the punk beside him that it physically hurt, Bucky felt for a second like they were back in Brooklyn Heights, in their little closet of an apartment in 1941, when Steve had angrily spat the same damned warning in Bucky’s face after nearly scaring the he out of him.

Bucky had been pulling double as many shifts as he could around the docks, quietly hoping to save up as much as they could before winter in the (inevitable) event that Steve got sick and they needed the spare cash.  He couldn’t exactly remember where he’d been able to finagle the hambone that he’d brought home to make soup with, but it had meant him getting in a half hour later than usual – to come through the door and find Steve with his spindly arms raised above his crooked spine, leaning awkwardly thanks to his bad ear and their rickety dining room chair as he tried to reach the heavy stock pot Bucky kept above the range.

Instead of speaking up and risking startling Steve (and because his heart felt like it was in his damned throat), Bucky had crossed the room in an instant and grabbed Steve around the waist, getting ready to bodily lift him down before he fell and broke his neck.  Steve had grabbed at his hands with a squawk, catching on to his exact intentions and angrily muttering his warning.

“And what, Steve… let you fall and break your fool neck?” Bucky had asked incredulously, his fingers gripping Steve’s hips so tightly that he could feel the edges of his bones through the material of his cheap pants.  “I don’t think so, pal… let’s get you down and I’ll take care of it.”

“I swear to God, Buck, if you don’t let me go…” he’d growled, looking all the more angry for Bucky’s response.

“And what, Stevie?  You gonna stay up there on the chair so you can reach to do it?”

The words were out of his mouth before he had the sense to stop them, and immediately he regretted them, moving his hands away and offering up as pleasant a smile as he could in response to Steve’s cold fury.  Bucky had an apology on the tip of his tongue, but before he could charm his way out of it, Steve had come back, completely dead pan.  “I won’t need a chair, Buck.  Remember, I know where you sleep.”

After a beat they had both laughed the entire thing off, although Bucky couldn’t deny the quick shiver of anticipation that had gone down his spine, having Steve utter so veiled a promise while looming over him.  It was so completely different from what he was used to – keeping completely hushed up about their shared single bed and what they got up to in it, never mind the odd juxtaposition of little Steve Rogers suddenly emanating all of the inner power that Bucky had always known (and seemed to be the only idiot in Brooklyn smart enough to notice) was housed in his small, fragile body.

At the end of it all, Bucky had been the one to retrieve the pot, despite Steve’s half-hearted griping.

That night they were blessed by the fact that Mrs. Burokowitz, the widow whose apartment shared a wall with theirs, was deaf as a doorknob.  Steve had kept to his promise, and Bucky had made so much noise they likely would have been arrested had anyone else lived next door.

Bucky shook his head softly, shaking off the memory to find Steve’s face softened.  He immediately gave him a shy smile, both to apologize for going away for a bit and to reassure him (the worrywart) that it had been to a good place, at least.

“Alright Grandpas, isn’t it almost your bedtime?” Tony’s voice cut into their reverie, effectively breaking the moment and reminding Bucky of the fact that they were still in front of a group of gathered guests.  “Could we get to it while _some_ of us are still young?!”

Bucky flipped him the bird with his metal hand, his eyes never leaving Steve’s as he remembered that night all of those years ago, and Tony’s rapturous praises of the hotel room he’d gotten them for the night.  Surely there’d be a surface in it that would be able to handle… whatever it was that Steve might come up with.

“I’m holdin’ you to that, Punk,” he murmured sweetly, before jamming the entire slice of cake into Steve’s gob, smearing what was left of it down his chin before sucking the frosting off of his fingers for good measure. 


	2. Second Chances and Shared Experiences

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve and Bucky decide to adopt a dog, to help with Bucky's continued recovery. They end up finding one that Bucky has far too much in common with to leave behind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a birthday fic for biblionerd7, who gave me the idea last night... so I thought I'd expand on the headcanon I wrote. I'm sorry in advance for the feels, friend, but I hope that you enjoy it!
> 
> Warnings for mentions of animal abuse,dog fighting, and euthanasia of stray animals, although nothing is explicit. Ultimately it's all bittersweet fluffy fluff, I promise.

As was the case with most things these days, getting a dog had been Sam’s idea.

Bucky’s progress in therapy and recovering in general had seemed to have hit a plateau 14 months after moving in with Steve, and while he was a far cry from the mess that he had been when they had finally tracked him down outside the burned-out remains of a HYDRA base in Romania, he still continued to have bad days and worse nightmares at least once a week. 

So Sam had brought up the idea of getting a dog, said that giving him an outlet, something to care for, might help to channel some of his anxiety and perpetual feelings of regret that seemed to overwhelm him at times.  And Steve – Steve had always wanted a dog, if he was honest with himself, he’d just either lacked the money or the time to feel like he could properly take care of one.

That wasn’t really an issue anymore, especially if Bucky was always around the house to take care of it on the rare occasions that the Avengers were called away on a mission big enough that they couldn’t go without Captain America.  So they’d discussed it in earnest, actually wrote out the pros and cons of bringing an animal into the apartment, double-checked the building rules with their landlord and started pricing out the supplies that they would need to get to adopt in the first place.

Bucky had always loved the strays in their old neighborhood, and apparently even all of the shit HYDRA had done to his head hadn’t taken that bit away from him.  He’d agreed to the idea of getting on easily, although was insistent that they rescue a mutt from the local shelter, rather than give money to some damned puppy mill.  Steve had no problem agreeing with him whole-heartedly.

So they’d dropped an obscene amount of money at a near-by pet shop, buying food and treats and collars and a leash, plus a dog bed and chew toys and special pet shampoo.  Bucky had snickered like a fool as he’d dropped a Frisbee that was a poor imitation of Steve’s shield into the cart; Steve had called him a jerk in response, threatening to get them a Pomeranian and make Bucky walk it every day, but the sound and the light in Bucky’s eyes had made the jesting completely worth the abuse.

Finally, they’d checked everything off of the list, completed the adoption forms for the shelter, and even passed the apartment inspection for final approval (“All of this for a _dog_ Steve… I mean, I’m glad they care where they’re sending them, but yeesh – can you even imagine trying to adopt a baby?”).   Upon getting the final approval call, Bucky had insisted they go directly to the shelter, hoping to pick out a dog before they closed for the evening.

Even looking at all of the dogs turned out to be more of a job than either of them had been expecting.  The area for adoptable dogs was enormous, packed with kennels full of all kinds of animals, from old strays to tiny puppies and apparently more breeds than Steve had even known existed.  Somehow he got separated from Bucky along the way – a happening that would have made him uneasy a few months prior, but Bucky seemed to be doing better in crowds every day, especially when he was focused on a task.  Steve was certain he’d be fine, and kneeled down to read the kennel card on a beautiful Golden Retriever, smiling as she pressed against the fence for his attention. 

He focused his attention on older, larger dogs; neither of them knew the first thing about training a puppy, and the woman at the intake desk during their first interview had told them that they tended to have the hardest time being adopted, anyway.  There was a German shepherd that especially caught Steve’s eye, a tiny bit of gray around his muzzle giving away his age before Steve learned it from his kennel card, which explained he was only in the shelter because his owners had grown too old to care for him anymore.

There was one final set of kennels set apart from the rest of the dogs in the back, marked for ‘Special Needs dogs’ with an indication that only approved adopters were allowed to visit, but considering he was armed with the appropriate paperwork Steve made his way into the area confidently, pausing in the entrance at the scene in front of him.

Bucky was sat on the floor in front of the kennel at the far end of the area, the only one that appeared to be occupied at the time, with broken pieces of dog biscuits (which Steve was fairly certain he had procured from somewhere in the shelter, given that they hadn’t even opened their packages at home) strewn across the floor and crumbs dusting his lap.  He was so completely focused on the dog whose forehead he was gently stroking back and forth that he didn’t even seem to hear Steve enter, while the dog’s eyes remained locked sadly on his.

And the dog… it was obvious that the dog had been through a lot.  It was a steel gray colored pitbull from the looks of it, and even laid out on the cement of the kennel floor Steve could see that it was a heavily muscled animal.  Its ears had been cropped closely to its head, which was covered in ugly gashes and scars – from where he stood, Steve wasn’t certain if it had a left eye or not.  Slowly, cautiously, he approached the kennel, kneeling down next to Bucky and softly speaking up when neither of them acknowledged him.  “What’s its story?”

“She was taken when her owners got busted for running a dog fighting ring,” Bucky answered, his voice soft but tense.  “They’d used her for breeding for a while but decided her pups were too small, so they made her a bait dog for the fighters instead.”

Steve’s jaw clenched tight as Bucky began talking – he’d been afraid that would be the story, but hearing

Bucky smiled sadly, his right hand scratching gently behind one of the dogs ears while his left hand slowly reached in to hand over another piece of biscuit, which she accepted gently, her tail thudding rhythmically against the concrete floor.  “Nah… the second someone hears she was involved in dog fighting they’re going to get nervous – even if she was a bait dog, there’s concern that she’ll be unpredictable and dangerous.  Right now they’re trying to find a rescue to move her to; they can only keep her here for so long, and most other shelters will probably euthanize her since she’s not adoptable.”

And just like that, Steve knew which dog they’d be walking out with – as if it hadn’t been obvious the second that he’d walked in and saw the two of them.  He swallowed around the lump in his throat, remembering how many times their friends had given him the same warnings about Bucky at the beginning.   “You wanna take her out in the yard?”  He finally heard himself ask thickly, “See if we can ask one of the volunteers to play with her for a minute, before making our decision?”

There was a long pause, before he saw the smile start to spread across Bucky’s face when he finally turned to look at Steve.  “Yeah…” he responded quietly, “yeah, let’s do that.  You wanna go outside, girl?”  He asked gently, turning back to the gate.

The dog didn’t react, other than to shuffle forward slightly on her belly, pressing her head closer against Bucky’s hand.  Steve shook his head, rising to his feet and making his way back into the main area to look for a shelter volunteer.  When he gave the young woman the kennel number he was interested in she looked shocked, stuttering out a confirmation before leading the way back to the isolation area, where she managed to look even more surprised when she caught sight of Bucky.

“Wow,” she said as she flipped through keys, an awed smile still on her face, “Blue hasn’t responded to _anyone_ in the weeks that she’s been here – she even cowers away from most of us.”

“We had a little talk… reached an understanding,” Bucky responded quietly, following close behind as they made their way out to the fenced in play-area at the back of the facility.  The dog, _Blue_ apparently, wouldn’t let him out of her sight anyway, walking slowly so that she remained beside Bucky’s side and barely reacting when the volunteer took the lead off of her, other than falling on the ground at Bucky’s feet and rolling over to expose her belly.

“Alright, alright,” he said with a laugh, kneeling down and rubbing her fur gently, his smile looking so familiar and happy that Steve’s chest ached as he watched it. 

After a few minutes, Steve knelt down as well, moving slowly and keeping his hands visible to the dog at all times before carefully extending one and gently rubbing her side as well.  To his relief, her only response was to glance at him shortly, her tail continuing to beat a staccato against the ground.  “Well,” Steve said quietly, beaming at Bucky, “guess there’s only one question left…”

“What’s that?”  Buck asked, looking away from the dog for the first time in minutes.

“What we’re going to name her.  No offense, but Blue is pretty terrible.”

Bucky laughed at that, patting her belly gently and taking his hand away before rolling to his feet.  Unsurprisingly, the dog jumped up immediately, watching him carefully.  “Let’s figure it out later.   At home – should we go home, girl?”

He seemed to recognize what he’d said a couple of seconds later, looking at Steve sheepishly.  “Ah… if that’s alright?  Unless – if you wanted to see another one, that’s fine.”

“No, we’re good.  She’s great.”  Steve agreed immediately, shaking his head with a smile.  It wasn’t entirely true, he knew – they hadn’t even discussed looking into a special needs dog, and would doubtlessly need to work with a trainer to rehabilitate her, not to mention sign God knew how many waivers with the building.  While the landlord had had no problem with Captain America having a dog in his building, somehow Steve thought them bringing home an obviously abused pitbull might be a different story. 

But… as she panted up at Bucky with her broad, trusting smile, Steve felt his heart melt even more, and his resolve set itself in stone.  It would be a lot of work, yes, but as evidenced by the man grinning down at her, Steve was more than willing to work for the ones he loved.

It would be well-worth it for all of them, in the long run.


	3. Pizza Pie of My Eye

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Written as a fill for [this tumblr prompt from the-mini-muse](https://the-mini-muse.tumblr.com/post/141808313201/stucky-story-idea-11): Every Saturday - it’s pizza night at Steve Rogers house. Bucky owns a pizza restaurant but he personally delivers said pizzas to (low key) ogle at the Hot Buff Blonde guy. What he doesn’t now is Steve has been trying to get his number for weeks now and his friends come over to eat the pizza that Steve doesn’t even eat. 
> 
> So... I might have belated realized that I wrote Fridays instead, but the idea still works ;)

Sam blinked, slowly and deliberately, as he raised his hands in surrender at the end of Steve’s adamant refusal.  “Hey man,” he muttered, “I meant no disrespect to Howlie’s - I just thought we might try a night where we order something different, and where you can eat something other than that sad iceberg lettuce excuse of a salad that you’re always stuck with.”

Steve sighed, rubbing his forehead in frustration and guilt.  He definitely had overreacted to Sam’s suggestion of ordering Thai food for their weekly game night, but when he’d saw Tony’s face immediately light up at the idea he’d panicked and done taken the first course of action that he deemed most likely to get what he wanted - shouted some garbled version of “NO WE NEED PIZZA,” then flushed like an idiot as the rest of the room gaped at him in confusion.

“Steve,” Natasha sighed from where she was reclining on the couch, “you can’t eat cheese. What is the point of ordering greasy pizzas every time we get together if the main ingredient makes you sick?  At least let us ask them about dairy-free options this time…”

“No,” Steve argued as he fiddled with the cell phone in his hand.  “No, I ah - I don’t want to be a pain in the ass for them.  I like the salad just fine, and I’ll steal some of the pepperoni like I usually do.”

“Why is it that you’re acting like we’re insulting your Nana’s prized meatloaf?” Tony asked with a bemused smirk.  “I mean - really?  What’s with your hang up over the pizza place?”

“It’s tradition,” Steve insisted, keeping his back to the wall as he pulled up the number for Howling Commandos on his speed dial, carefully avoiding the eye that he could feel Natasha giving him.  In reality, Steve’s reasoning was even more ridiculous; Nat was right in pointing out that Steve couldn’t eat the majority of their pizza offerings, and he could hardly blame Sam for being sick of having the same food every Friday night for the past three months, regardless of how good it might have been.  No, the real reason that Steve was so set on continuing game nights at his house ten weeks after his initial housewarming party, with the same pizza joint delivering every time, was because of his massive, embarrassing, crippling crush on the delivery guy.  And Steve would bet money that Natasha knew it - she’d always had the uncanny ability of seeing through him, especially when it came to the people he was interested in.

There was a short groan from the rest of the group in the living room but no further argument, so Steve went ahead and dialed in their usual order, moving to the kitchen for a moment of privacy after feeling like he’d already given too much away.  The line picked up before the second ring was finished, and Steve was glad that he’d moved away from the prying eyes of his friends - he could feel the dopey grin spread across his face the instant that he recognized the familiar, husky voice on the other end.

“This is Howling Commandos Pizza, can I get a name for your order?”

“Uh… yeah…” Steve stammered, feeling his ears heat up as he imagined the man that he knew was on the other end of the phone.  He hadn’t been gone this badly for anyone since when he’d first met Peggy in college.  “Yeah, it’s Rogers.”

“Steve?”  The guy on the other end asked, his tone slightly lighter and mildly amused.  “You wanna get your usual?”

“Yeah, you got it,” Steve answered with a chuckle, wishing that he could have come up with something more witty to throw back.  “And, um - can I get an order of wings, too?” He added at the last moment, remembering the ribbing he’d gotten for living off of salad while he force-fed the rest of the group pizza. 

“Sure, ranch or bleu cheese for the dressing?”  

It was on the tip of Steve’s tongue to just say ranch and hand it over to the rest of the group, when he remembered Nat’s suggestion that he branch out and ask for an accommodation for a change.  “Uh - do you have anything without dairy in it?”

There was a pause on the other end of the line before the guy at the pizza shop laughed.  “Sure, we have a barbecue sauce that actually goes pretty well with ‘em, but you’ve ordered a hell of a lot of cheese over the past few weeks to have a lactose problem…”

“It’s just one of us,” Steve responded immediately, covering his face with his free hand as he felt it flush spectacularly and hoping like hell that his crush would take the vague hint (lie) that it wasn’t him.

“Alright, good,” the pizza guy responded brightly.  “So that’s gonna be one large pepperoni pizza, one medium cheese, a medium Hawaiian, a large antipasto salad without the parm, and an order of wings with a side of barbecue.  Got it?”

“Nailed it,” Steve answered enthusiastically, before cringing in embarrassment.  

“Great, should be over in about twenty.”  

Steve waited a moment, leaning against the kitchen counter and tapping the phone idly against his lower lip, before collecting himself and heading back into the living room to wait.

~*~

Bucky had been waiting by the phone for the past fifteen minutes - he usually hated taking phone orders; he was more in his element either working the register and actually interacting face-to-face with the customers or focusing on actually cooking in the back, but on Fridays between six and seven he made an exception.  Because Steve Rogers - the actual hottest man that Bucky had ever been blessed to lay eyes on, and that was saying something - had called in an order around that time every Friday night for the past nine weeks, and Bucky wasn’t about to miss his chance to make it an even ten.

He was pretty sure that both Gabe and Dernier were on to him, the way that they snickered whenever he migrated towards the phone on Fridays, but Bucky didn’t give a damn.  So he had a type, and made it pretty obvious when he was smitten?  They couldn’t really blame him for getting excited about it, especially given how long of a dry spell he’d been on.  (Two years eight months two weeks and three days, since the week before the accident.  Not that anyone was counting.)

The second the familiar number flashed across the caller ID of the shop Bucky turned to the wall, grinning like a putz as he picked it up.  He consciously lowered his voice a bit, masking the fact that he was wound-up like a giddy school kid with a crush, but otherwise got through the order without issue.  

He paused as he entered the order in after hanging up the phone, though, kicking himself for not having brought up the fact that they had vegan cheez available in case whoever it was that was lactose intolerant wanted a pie.  By the time he’d completed the work ticket for the order he had an idea, and plugged in a second order for a personal pan lactose-free pepperoni  pie under his own name.

There had to be  _ some _ benefits to co-owning a pizzeria, after all.

Bucky handed the phone off to Dernier and made his way to the back, deciding to cook the additional pizza himself since they’d have to dig the ingredients up anyway.

“Becca visiting?”  Dum-Dum asked in confusion, already tossing the dough for the other pies on the order.

“Ah, no,” Bucky stammered briefly, “apparently one of the regulars has an issue with dairy and never bothered mentioning; I figured I’d throw this one in on me, in case they want to start changing up the order.”

“So we’ll call this one… the Beefy Blonde supreme?”  Dugan asked, smirking so hard that his moustache actually twitched.

Bucky flipped him off in response as he made his way into the cooler, digging out the package of vegan cheez that he’d special-ordered at his sister’s request.  Initially the rest of the crew had been scandalized by the idea of using fake cheese on a pizza, but the taste of it actually wasn’t bad and the brand that Becca had recommended had a shockingly normal texture, so Bucky didn’t feel bad using it when requested, despite the team’s refusal of having it put on the regular menu as an option.

After throwing on a hairnet and washing his hands Bucky set to work at light-speed, throwing the small pizza together and putting it in to bake with the rest of the order.  He was already pulling his jacket on as the order came up, and grabbed it before Monty could get hold of it to take to the car.

“Uh Sarge - you do remember that we set up roles for a reason, right?”  Monty asked bemusedly.

“I do, but you’re about to go on break so I’ll take this one,” Bucky insisted, completely ignoring the look that Monty and Morita shared as he high-tailed it out the rear door of the restaurant.  They could bag on him all they wanted when he got back after the delivery - Bucky had a special order to take care of.

~*~ 

Steve was out of his seat the second the doorbell finished ringing, and practically ran for the door, hoping like hell that their usual delivery guy was waiting for him.  It had occurred to Steve a couple of times that it seemed odd to have the same employee taking phone calls and delivering pizzas, especially given as popular as Howling Commandos seemed to be, but he wasn’t about to complain about the coincidence.  He threw the door open with a smile, which only grew when he caught sight of the man waiting in the hall.

He was about an inch shorter than Steve but even under his jacket Steve could tell that pizza guy was incredibly well-built.  His long brunette hair was pulled back in a ponytail and stuffed under a Howling Commandos ball cap, the dark blue of which made his steel grey eyes pop beautifully, even in the shitty light of Steve’s apartment complex hallway.  

“Hey,” Steve murmured, like a giant fucking meatball, before shaking himself and grabbing his wallet out of his back pocket.

“How’s it going?”  The pizza guy responded with a crooked smile, completely ignoring the way that Steve fumbled with his bills as he struggled to take his eyes off his mouth.

They exchanged the money without issue, then Hot Pizza Guy unzipped his insulated bag, handing over the pizza boxes and paper bags as usual.  After an awkward goodbye, Steve carried the tower of boxes back into the kitchen, where Sam had already pulled out plates and the rest of the group waited excitedly for their food.

Steve opened the smallest box as the others dug into the pizzas, blinking in surprise when it turned out to be a small pie instead of the wings he’d ordered.  “Uh…” he muttered, reaching for the paper bag that had been included in their haul.

“Don’t tell me they dicked the order up,” Tony mused as he piled pepperoni slices onto his plate.  “Seriously, I’m calling up Sri Thai if you don’t have food here.”

There was a styrofoam container full of wings at the bottom of the bag, which left Steve frowning as he went back to the small pizza box.  “No, they’ve got mine - I think they accidentally added someone else’s order, though.”

“I’m not about to complain about free food,” Sam responded with a grin, opening the small box and pulling it towards him.  He frowned slightly as he read the side of the box, but as he finished reading it and looked at the contents inside he started smiling again.  “Dude,” he said fondly, pushing it back to Steve.

“What is it?” Natasha asked coyly, although the quirk of her lips gave away her own amusement.

Steve actually looked at the side of the box, trying to work out what they were talking about - pan pizza was checked, pepperoni was checked, and cheese… was crossed through with the word DF CHEEZ scrawled over top of it.  Steve felt a funny jolt in his guts as he opened the box again, this time noticing the message written on the inside as well.   **_Thought you might want to try our dairy-free option, in case you’re sick of salads.  LMK what you think ;)_ ** It was signed with the name  **_Bucky_ ** followed by ten digits.

Steve could only imagine how stupid his face looked as he put it together, especially going by the loud chorus of heckling laughter that went through the rest of the kitchen.

~*~

Bucky practically ran back to the restaurant, feeling half-sick with worry as his mind turned over and over whether or not he’d made a huge mistake.  He had no way of knowing if Buff Blonde Hottie was even the one with the lactose intolerance - for all Buck knew it was actually for his girlfriend.  He’d seen a hot redhead in the living room a few times during deliveries… knowing his luck his one bold move of flirtation would end up in losing the Howlie’s business at best, or Bucky getting his ass kicked by an offended boyfriend at worst.  

He did his best to shake the feeling of dread off as he got back into the restaurant, hanging up his cell phone with his jacket and throwing himself into work instead.  At least he had the boy’s teasing and the steady business of the Friday night rush to keep his mind off of it.

Bucky finally took his break shortly after 11:30PM, grabbing his jacket and sneaking off to the closest Bodega for literally anything that wasn’t pizza, subs, or wings; while he was damned proud of the food that the Howlie’s made, one could only eat so much of their own work.  Although he did his best not to look at his phone, he couldn’t ignore the New Message alert on the screen when he handed over the money for his dinner.  

Bucky waited until he was back on the street to open his message app, holding his breath as he clicked on the most recent series of texts.

**Text From   New Contact  Received: 9:35PM**

_ hey it’s Steve Rogers - the pizza was great, thanks so much for including it!  I’ll def add that to the regular order. _

**Text From  New Contact  Received: 9:42PM**

_ actually, I’d like to say thank you in person, if that’s not too weird?  do you like coffee? _

Bucky blinked down at his phone screen for a second, before giving a whoop of excitement, totally ignoring the looks that he got from passers by as they moved away from him on the sidewalk.  After chewing on his lip for a second, Bucky sent off his response with a broad grin.

**Text To  Steve Rogers  Sent: 11:42PM**

_ sorry so late, just finished up rush.  and it’s not weird at all - I love coffee!  just say where and when and it’s a date :)  _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you're so inclined you can [find me on tumblr](http://0n-y0ur-left.tumblr.com/), where I mainly yell about these idiots and post cute shit about dogs.


	4. Pizza Pie of My Eye, the Redux

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One month after the day that Bucky finally got the nerve to ask Steve out, they celebrate their anniversary by making a pie together. The rest of the night goes well, at least.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The-mini-muse requested a sequel to the other Pizza Place AU when I asked for ficlet prompts... the idea was too cute to say no ;)

It was unbelievable, really, how seamlessly Steve and Bucky fit into one another’s lives.  

Their coffee date that Sunday had lasted long enough to run-over into a lunch date and a movie before Bucky’d had to call it quits to get to work, with the promise that he would make it up to Steve with dinner later that week.  They were able to make two dinner dates work during the week, while exchanging a ridiculous number of texts and snapchats in-between, and by the time their first weekend together rolled around Steve had been able to convince his friends into changing game nights to Saturday so that Bucky could join and bringing their own significant others.

The group had been surprisingly okay with the change, and Tony had nearly cried when Bucky came through the door with a massive order of food from the Chinese place up the block from Howlie’s who had apparently owed him a food exchange anyway.  Things only got better from there.

Not only did Bucky fit in easily with Steve’s friends, but on the weekend nights that Steve joined Bucky after close and headed out with the team from the Howling Commandos to their favorite waterhole, he seemed to mesh just as well.  It didn’t hurt that they were all former military, as Steve had been, or that they shared common interests (enough that Steve was able to forgive Dugan the fact that he was Yankees fan… although it took some work).  

By the time their one month anniversary rolled around it was less of a surprise that they had been dating for as long as they had, and more of a shock to recognize that they hadn’t known each other for their entire lives.  They each already had a toothbrush in the other’s bathroom and a shelf for their clothes in the closet, and despite the differences in their schedule they started finding ways to work out spending more nights together than they spent apart.

Bucky insisted that it was the happiest he’d ever been in his life; Steve  _ knew _ as much was true for him.

They had already agreed that they were going to keep things casual for the night - Steve felt like a big enough tool for wanting to celebrate so short an anniversary to begin with, but he also wanted to do something special for Bucky all the same.  He couldn’t help the pathetically romantic part of him that hoped this was the first of many such celebrations for them, so giving into the urge to go a bit over the top just made sense.  

Thankfully, Steve had finished with the design projects that he had scheduled for the day before noon, so he had plenty of time to prepare for the night.  Changing plans and actually going out seemed like too drastic a measure, but considering they had been practically living off of Bucky’s huge network of take-out trades from half of the restaurants around the neighborhood, Steve figured that a nice night in with a homecooked meal would be an adequate compromise.  He grabbed his phone with a sly smile and sent a confirmation text off as he finalized his idea in his head.

**Text To:  Bucky  sent: 12:15**

_ hey, we still on for dinner tonight? _

**Text From:  Bucky  received: 12:18**

_ as long as you’ll still have me ;) _

Steve chuckled as he read the message, grinning like an idiot as he typed out his response.

**Text To:  Bucky  sent: 12:19**

_ careful, i might never let u go :P _

**Text From:  Bucky  received: 12:19**

_ that’s what i was hoping for :x   _

God, he was already so gone on the guy it was actually embarrassing - not that Steve had any desire to change the fact.  He looked into the pantry one final time before making his mind up, sending his response off as he slipped into his sneakers.

**Text To:  Bucky  sent 12:21**

_ great. don’t bring food, i’ve got it _

The message bubbled blinked a few times as Steve retrieved his keys and wallet from the kitchen counter, but his phone pinged again before he could make it out the door.

**Text From: Bucky received: 12:23**

_ why bother buying takeout?  it’s not a hassle for me _

Steve smirked as he called for the elevator and typed back his response.

**Text To:  Bucky  sent: 12:24**

_ who said anything about takeout? _

The reception in the elevator was shitty enough that he didn’t receive a response until he was nearly out the front door of the building.

**Text From:  Bucky  received: 12:28**

_ youre gonna cook?  weren’t you bragging about burning water the other night? _

Steve shook his head as he turned towards the grocery store, keeping half an eye on the sidewalk so he didn’t run into anyone as he texted back.

**Text To:  Bucky sent: 12:29**

_ that was 1 time!  i’m a great cook _

If Bucky had anything else to say Steve didn’t catch it - he found himself outside of Trader Joe’s, and despite the odd hour of the day the place was, as always, still too packed to be texting and shopping at the same time.  He dropped his cell phone into his jeans pocket with a regretful sigh, before grabbing a cart and making his way through the aisles.

Of course, the problem with going about executing his plan before he’d actually taken the time to make it came up pretty quickly; after throwing a bunch of greens and fixings for salad into the cart, he found himself standing in the cheese aisle with the realization that he hadn’t actually worked out what he wanted to make, yet.  For a moment he considered pasta, in part to spite Bucky’s teasing from earlier and in part due to the fact that he didn’t actually know how cook much else, but ultimately Steve decided against it… even if he did dress the fresh-packaged pasta that the store offered up, it was still ultimately a pretty boring dinner.  He was far from a gourmand, but he also knew that he could do better than something as simple as store-bought pasta.

Steve was in the middle of searching through chicken recipes on his phone when inspiration struck - it as a risk, for sure, and it would almost certainly mean getting razzed by Bucky for the rest of the night: but it also was a safe-bet for dinner, and possibly a fun date as well.  He made his way back to the refrigerated section, picking out all of the necessary ingredients with a knowing grin, then at the last minute grabbed a package of chicken breasts in case the idea was a total flop, before finally making his way to the check-out line to pay.

Bucky knocked on the door a couple of minutes before seven, greeting Steve with a fond smile and a deep, hot kiss before they had even cleared out of the doorway.  Steve couldn’t even bring himself to be embarrassed by his own dopey face as Bucky slipped his jacket off and made his way into the living room, sniffing the air as he went.  “Is the food ready?  I was expecting something more… fragrant.”

“Uh, about that,” Steve chuckled, following him in the direction of the kitchen, “I actually had an idea that might be fun,” he trailed off as Bucky made his way into the kitchen, stopping in the doorway to survey the ingredients that Steve already had out on the island at the center.

“Seriously?” Bucky asked after a long pause, scoffing as he walked up to the gathered pile of food and holding up the jar of pizza sauce. “You called me over to make pizzas together and then you bring this garbage into the mix?”  He shot the jar a dirty look, although Steve already knew him well enough to catch the glint of amusement in Bucky’s eyes.  “Babe… this might count as irreconcilable differences.”

“I mean, it’s technically our anniversary, so I figured: why not go back to where we started?”  Steve asked, trying his best to defend himself.  “And what’s wrong with the sauce?”

“It’s terrible, overly-salted, bland shit,” Bucky scoffed, dropping the offending jar back to the countertop - Steve didn’t miss the color that was rising on the apples of his cheeks, though, and couldn’t help the thrill of excitement in his belly knowing that, even if he hadn’t grabbed the best ingredients he at least was pushing the right buttons.

“Did my best with what I could,” Steve muttered, shrugging as Bucky continued to sort through the ingredients.  “I mean, if you’d prefer I have other stuff we could prepare, instead…”

“No,” Bucky interrupted, looking over and giving Steve a reassuring smile.  “No, this will work.  Just,” he lifted the ball of dough that Steve had bought with a look of horror, “just never let the guys hear that we used this.  They may very well fire me from my own pizza joint.”

“It’ll be our dirty little secret,” Steve promised as earnestly as he could, not bothering to smother the shit-eating grin that took over his face as he sidled up next to the island.

“And next time just tell me, I’ll bring the ingredients over,” Bucky continued, opening the packages around him as Steve flipped on the oven to preheat and set a baking sheet out on the island next to them.

“That kinda defeats the purpose, Buck,” Steve countered, grabbing Bucky’s ass playfully as the other started separating the dough.

“Fine then,” Bucky huffed, leaning sideways and stealing a quick peck of a kiss from Steve’s lips as his hands began separating the dough into pan-sized portions.  “But that means at some point in the next couple’a weeks I’m going to teach you how to make dough and sauce yourself,” he continued on without missing a beat.  “I swear, my Nana would be rolling in her grave if she knew I was about to let my boyfriend eat this…”

“Nah, she’d probably just smack you for saddling yourself to such a schmuck in the first place,” Steve quipped.  Part of him felt like he should probably be offended for the stink that Bucky was raising about the food, but it all felt so remarkably good-natured that he couldn’t be anything other than charmed, especially when he caught the stupid little smile Bucky gave his wad of dough before responding.  Plus, Steve’s stupid heart would probably let Bucky get away with saying just about anything as long as it involved him also calling Steve his  _ boyfriend _ ...

“I think she’d get it if she met you, honestly.  But she’d still give me hell about this.”  Bucky handed one of the balls of dough Steve’s way before tossing his in the air, spinning it twice and catching it on his finger tips so that it stretched out perfectly.  “I’m serious about the cooking lessons, though.”

Steve shrugged, picking his dough up and passing it between his hands for a moment, trying to work out exactly how Bucky had tossed his own crust to make it so perfectly.  Honestly, he’d been so caught up in watching Bucky’s hands that he hadn’t exactly paid attention to what they’d  _ done _ .  “I can live with that compromise,” he agreed easily, all-too-happy to schedule more time with _ his boyfriend _ , even if it only meant being teased mercilessly in the kitchen.

With a deep breath Steve tossed his dough into the air, wincing as it came down too quickly, barely stretched, although apparently enough for his fingers to poke a hole straight through the center.

“Stevie,” Bucky groaned, settling his own crust down on the pan then moving behind Steve to help him in his second attempt.  “Come on, just toss it up easily and flick your wrist as you go… like that.”

“You helping me or distracting me?” Steve snarked breathlessly, moving his ass back barely half an inch so that it was pressed firmly against Bucky’s crotch to prove his point while paying zero attention to the wad of dough in his hands.

“If you hurry up and get these pizzas thrown together hopefully I can do a little of both,” Bucky murmured huskily into his ear.  

Steve’s second attempt ended up landing with a pitiful splat on the island countertop.

Bucky took full responsibility for that debacle, at least, and ended up helping him reshape the dough after only a few moments of cracking up (which Steve joined in on, in fairness) before showing him how to spread the dough out on the pan, instead of tossing it like normal.  

In the end Steve’s pie didn’t look  _ quite _ as nice as Bucky’s, but it looked edible when it went in the oven.  Coming out of the oven was a bit of a different story… neither of them could say for sure whether it was the quality of the dough or how much they’d had to handle it, but the crusts ended up soggy even once they were cooked through, and the dairy-free cheese Steve had picked up didn’t hold a candle to whatever it was that Bucky had bought for the Howlies.

It smelled edible, at least.

“I think it turned out okay,” Steve stated pleasantly as they settled down to eat in front of the TV, ignoring the way that his crust flopped over sadly and threatened to take half of the toppings with it. 

Bucky’s piece had turned out so uneven that he was actually eating it with a fork and knife, despite his earlier insistence that it was practically a crime against humanity to eat pizza with utensils.  He jammed a bite in his mouth, watching Steve he entire time out of the corner of his eye with a nasty glint that took all of Steve’s self-control not to bust up laughing at. 

“You’re lucky I love you,” Bucky finally muttered, once he’d finished the bite and was cutting another piece off of his soggy slice.  

They both froze in place the second he’d said it, and Steve watched as the color drained out of Bucky’s face, guessing that his was probably doing the same judging by the clammy feel of his skin and suddenly racing heart.  Steve was crazy gone on Bucky, had been since the first time that he had seen him standing in the hallway outside of his door on the night of that first pizza delivery, and while he had no doubt that the feeling was obviously returned, neither of them had said  _ those  _ words yet.  

Not because Steve hadn’t felt them, but because he had worried that it was too soon… that he would end up scaring Bucky off if he rushed things.  But he was hardly a coward, and now that Bucky had slipped up and said it, too…

“I am lucky,” Steve murmured, dropping his slice back to the plate and turning slightly so that he was facing Bucky.  “Lucky as hell, considering how much I love you, too.”

There was another beat of silence, and then the sounds of their plates and Bucky’s cuttlery hitting the coffee table, and then they were both too busy tearing at each other’s clothing and going about proving just how true their words were through action to pay any attention to the movie that they had put on or to worry about the crappy pizza they had made.

It ended up being better reheated, anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always I'm available [on tumblr](http://0n-y0ur-left.tumblr.com) if you have any requests, or if you just want to join me in yelling about these two.


	5. Paint Wars

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> From [this tumblr post](http://pumpkinspicedbarnes.tumblr.com/post/151901056321/post-break-up-au) of post break-up AUs: "soon to be divorced couple obnoxiously painting the walls wacky colours every time the other paints over it."
> 
> Some wonderful anon pointed out how cute of an idea it was for Stucky and... my hand slipped

At some point during their nine-week whirlwind romance, when they had met with a ridiculous shower of imaginary sparks and hooked up by the end of the night, then proceeded to burn as brightly as two artists were wont to do, spending every second that they could together in a fit of reckless, passionate abandon, Bucky had admitted to Steve that his favorite color was Barbie pink.  After Steve had laughed until he’d nearly made himself sick, Buck had begrudgingly pointed out that it was because of the Barbie dreamhouse he’d spent countless hours playing with his sisters at while they were growing up, and so reminded him of the happiest times in his life (before meeting Steve, of course) and well… Steve had fell impossibly more for the beautiful sap that he was lucky enough to call his new boyfriend.

So when they had eloped on a whim four weeks later, Steve had decided to paint the accent wall of the sitting room of the condominium they had decided to make their newlywed nest that same bright, obnoxious pink.  The intention had been for it to be a gag wedding gift, but Bucky had been so overwhelmed and grateful that he’d never gotten around to painting over it, and for the rest of their honeymoon phase Steve had quickly come to fall in love with the color, too.

In the beginning, everything had been perfect; Bucky had been careful to schedule his events around Steve’s travel schedule, so that they could globetrot together when Steve went off hunting for priceless pieces of art and consulting galleries around the world on the setup of their collections.  When they were home, Steve did his best to make life as easy as possible for Bucky as he fought writer’s block and banged out one hit suspense novel after the other, with his publishers going wild over the new-found romance that he was able to tie into his already famous action plots.  

And, of course, they made love in the sitting room as often as possible, giggling like idiots over the wall and their luck and how crazy they were for each other.

But as the months stretched on, and started to transition into years together, that white hot spark started to fade.  Bucky’s fame continued building steam, so that he couldn’t travel quite as often as he wanted: his deadlines grew tighter, his book releases grew into larger events, necessitating that he travel for release parties and promotional interviews and signings.  And while Steve was proud as hell of his husband’s accomplishments, his own name was growing in importance as well.  

In the beginning, the change was subtle.  They’d spend luxurious long weekends at home, completely wrapped up in one another, before regretfully parting to jet off to opposite sides of the globe for work.  And with time, it became worse… on the rare occasion that they did return home at the same time, they were usually too jetlagged to do much more than get one another off before passing out.

In time, it devolved to the point that they were barely even making time for _that_ much; it was more likely that Steve would come home to find Bucky already passed out in their bed, and so would stumble into the guest room to pass out in peace, saving them both the hassle of lost sleep.

So it really shouldn’t have come as a surprise when Steve had trudged through the door after his hellishly long Uber ride from JFK to find Bucky sitting stiffly on the couch in the sitting room, pointedly avoiding looking at the hot pink wall to instead focus on the stack of papers in his lap.  All the same, Steve had totally expected it to be yet another manuscript for yet another novel - perhaps one that he would ask Steve to look over first, as he had when they were still constantly excited to hear one another’s opinion on every other thing.

When Steve realized that they were divorce papers, he saw red.

Buck, of course, insisted that it was no one’s fault - that they’d rushed into this too fast, that they probably should have taken more time to really figure out what they wanted out of a marriage and how they could make it work.  He didn’t hate Steve, he just didn’t feel like he knew him anymore, and that was hardly a way to live, was it?

Steve - who admittedly had always had a penchant for the dramatic - ended up chucking his wedding ring at the wall and marching back out the door of the apartment without another word, calling Sam on the way down the street so that he would have a place to crash for the night.

The next day he returned to their apartment to begin packing his shit, and brought along with him a can of primer and another of the same eggshell white that covered the other three walls of the sitting room.  By the time he had finished loading his boxes (he only vaguely wondered where the hell Bucky had gone off to… not that he cared, of course, but he hardly wanted to run into him during his project), the Barbie wall was gone completely.  

It made sense, he told himself as he locked the door of the condo behind him, considering they would be selling the place once the divorce was final anyway - and no one in their right mind would buy a place that had been intentionally designed to have one room look like a damned Barbie dreamhouse.

The exceptionally terrible thing about having to move himself out, Steve realized as he boarded his plane for Paris, was that there was no way that he could fit in a proper move around his schedule; and he was just stubborn enough to refuse to hire movers to do it for him. So when he got back to New York at the end of the week, he had to make his way back to the condo, skulking his way through the front door before sighing in relief when he realized that, yet again, the place was empty.

He hauled his empty suitcase back to the bedroom, hoping to load up the majority of his clothes within an hour, but came to a stop as he passed the sitting room.  

The sitting room, whose accent wall had been painted a ridiculous, neon lime green.

It took Steve a solid minute to recover from the shock, before hot anger started to creep up the back of his neck.  How dare Bucky be such a sore sport about the move, especially when _he_ was the one who had proposed the divorce in the first place?  If he thought that Steve was going to be the one to roll over and try to sell a condo with a stupidly painted sitting room, he had another thing coming.

When Steve finally left that evening, he had successfully cleaned out his closet and one of his drawers in their shared dresser.  

He’d also left the accent wall the ugliest, most-dated dark brown color he’d been able to find on sale at the hardware store.

Bucky countered with a mustard yellow, without even bothering to prime over the brown first so that it was an exceptionally terrible turd-color when Steve visited the condo next.  He slopped on a vintage avocado layer of paint before taking off with three-quarters of their shared office supplies as pay-back.

Steve had half-expected to be called out for the admittedly bitchy move, but was absolutely not disappointed to not hear from Bucky in the week that followed, no matter what Tony said about it over drinks.

He had pre-emptively picked up a can of salmon paint on his way back to the condo to pack up the last of his knick-knacks, but yet again found himself surprised by the state of the sitting room when he walked into it to wrap up picture frames.

The accent wall was still obnoxious, of course, and at first glance it made Steve’s blood boil yet again; but after looking at it for a moment, he placed why the color was so familiar - it perfectly matched the plush little bear that he had just finished throwing in the trash, a tacky little reminder of their first real date together when Bucky had blown $50 before finally winning the prize for Steve on one of the rigged games on the Coney Island Boardwalk.  He spent the rest of the afternoon carefully packing away his items, all the while torturing himself with wondering whether or not the color choice had been intentional on Bucky’s part - if he was actually making a half-assed attempt at apologizing to Steve.

In the end, Steve made a second trip to the hardware store, and didn’t leave the condo until well after dark.

The wall behind him when he closed the door had needed to be blended specially, and was the same stormy grey as Bucky’s eyes… it worked as an accent wall anyway, and Steve had never bothered to hide the fact that they were his favorite thing about Bucky.

(After his heart.  And his sweetness.  And the ridiculous, dorky, shy way he always tried to go about being a romantic.  He usually failed spectacularly at it, but Steve had always thought it was part of his charm… not that he was about to admit as much now).

The next week took Steve to Eastern Europe, which only reminded him more of Bucky, much to his dismay.  There were multiple times when he was waiting between art auctions with his cell phone in hand, ready to fire off a text to his husband… in the end, the fear of having his heart broken or coming across as too-desperate stopped him from pressing send.

It didn’t stop him from visiting the condo again when he got back to New York, though.

This time, Steve was hugely disappointed to come through the door to the silent, empty walls of their home.  He nearly turned around and walked back out, chiding himself for having been foolish enough to have convinced himself that they had anything left to save, but before he could he caught a glimpse of the sitting room table, and the huge stack of papers setting on it.  With a deep breath and a heavy heart, Steve walked through the condo, coming to a stop at the entryway to the sitting room.

The accent wall was Tiffany blue, the same color as the box that Bucky had held out to him over dinner a couple of years prior, and yet again Steve found himself choked up and shocked as he stared at it.  He had no idea how much time passed before he realized that there was an envelope taped up in the center of the wall: even from paces away, he could see Bucky’s familiar, slanted handwriting where he had printed _Steve_ across the front of it.

With shaking hands Steve pulled the envelope off of the wall and opened it, tipping the ring that was sealed inside into his palm before unfolding the note beside it.

_Stevie,_

_I know I said that it felt wrong being married to a stranger, but in the past few weeks I feel like I’ve started to get to know my husband again and realized how much I missed him.  My tour ends next weekend, and I’ve told my publisher that I’m taking a couple month hiatus before starting on the next installment of the series._

_It might not be my right to ask, but I’d really like to see you in that time.   I do still love you, so much babe, and I wanna see if we can work this out._

_All my love,_

_Bucky_

_PS - if you’d rather not, I’ve left the papers for you on the table.  Just sign where the tabs are and I’ll have my lawyers be in touch instead of bothering you again._

Steve could barely see the damned papers on the table through his tears, but he still hauled them off and dumped them in the trash before getting himself together.  He washed his face and headed off to his favorite art supply store, knowing there was really only one way he could possibly respond to Bucky’s letter.

It had been hellacious getting his schedule changed around on such short notice, and required Steve to cut his trips to Italy and London both short, but in the end he’d managed to free himself up three weeks of travel time when he finally returned to New York - if all went as planned, it would be more than worth the busy work he’d promised his buyers to make up for it.  He annoyed his cabbie all the way from the airport to the condo, barking out short-cuts and instructions before the guy finally cussed him out and ended up forcing him to walk the final two blocks home in the rain… he climbed the stairs home dripping wet, simultaneously cursing the world and hoping like hell that it would all be worth it in the end.

He pushed the door of the condo open to find the light on in the sitting room, and made his way there immediately, wet coat and all.  Bucky was curled up on the couch in front of the accent wall, looking incomprehensibly gorgeous in a worn t-shirt and sweatpants in front of the huge mural of [the Heart Nebula](https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/af/7e/07/af7e07223364a18649bd98802074c26b.jpg) that Steve had painstakingly painted on the wall.

“Hey,” Steve said softly, giving him a shy smile as Bucky looked up from the photo album he’d been thumbing through.  “Whatcha lookin’ at?”

“Some sappy pictures of the nerd that made this big dorky painting for me,” Bucky answered thickly, before looking up at Steve with a broad smile and bright eyes that said he was every bit as taken with emotion as Steve felt.

Steve had crossed the sitting room before he’d even realized it, falling onto the couch next to Bucky and pulling him into a tight, desperate hug that was eagerly returned.  “I missed you so much, Buck,” he murmured quietly into his soft chestnut hair, “I’m so sorry.”

“I am too, Stevie,” Bucky whispered as he nuzzled against Steve’s jaw.  “I was no better, and I just… I didn’t even realize how much it was all worth fightin’ for until your stubborn ass fought back.”

“Yeah - maybe we should work on actually talking about shit next time, instead of letting them snowball like they did?”  Steve suggested gently, sitting back just enough that he could look Bucky in the eye.  “I’ve got the next two weeks to work from home, how about we go on a couple of dates, try to start making up for lost time and workout how we’re gonna do this better going forward?”

“Sounds perfect,” Bucky answered with a smile, one that grew cheekier as he added, “there’s a show at the Hayden Planetarium, I already booked us tickets for tomorrow afternoon, since you clearly need a refresher on your star patterns.”

As if to make his point, Bucky flicked the light switch behind him, plunging the room into darkness - except for the dots of glow-in-the-dark paint that had been painted across the nebula to spell out the words:

**_I LOVE YOU_ **

“I was tryin’ to make a gesture, you jerk,” Steve laughed good naturedly as he felt Bucky pull him down on top of him on the floor in front of the couch, shivering as familiar hands snaked under his wet shirt and started to peel it off.

“I know, punk,” Bucky chuckled, as a rustle of dry fabric indicated that he was pulling his own clothes off as well.  “I love you, too.”


	6. Realize

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This was a prompt fill that I had submitted by an anon on tumblr - it's meant to be in the AtB 'verse, but it's technically MCU compliant as well so I figured I would just throw it here. Prompt: Send me a “Realize” and I’ll write a drabble about one character realizing they love the other.

Despite what anyone might say about him, Steve Rogers had always been a realist - yeah, he held people to high expectations, and he had a tendency of pushing his body to limits that it had no way of ever actually reaching… but he still understood the way the world worked, and his brain worked within the boundaries of that reality.  That being said, he’d known for months that his Ma wasn’t long for this Earth, not once the consumption really took her in its clutches.  

That didn’t mean that he felt any less lost now that she was actually gone.

Those first few days after he’d gone to the Sanitorium only to find his mother’s cot empty, Steve had wandered around in a fog.  Truth be told, he still wasn’t even entirely sure how he’d ended up back at home after finally talking to the doctors there and confirming her body in the morgue… one moment he’d been staring at a corpse on a slab, then the next he was back in their apartment in bed, with someone puttering around in the kitchen while a bowl of watery stew cooled on the nightstand beside him.

(That someone was Bucky, his mind supplied, although it didn’t really connect any significance to the realization.  Of course it was Buck: outside of Sarah Rogers, who the hell would care if Steve ate before bed?)

It became a theme, as the days after Sarah’s death played out - Steve wandered around, organizing her funeral and packing up her belongings, and all the while Bucky was there; hovering in the background and helping out when Steve couldn’t ask for it.  It was Bucky who took Sarah’s favourite dress to the coroner’s so she could be dressed for the funeral, and Bucky who walked Steve to the church her funeral would be held in, sitting in the pew right alongside Steve despite the fact that the rest of the Barnes family had settled in a few rows back.  

And so, it definitely wasn’t a surprise when Steve found Buck waiting on the stoop of the tenement after he finally made his way back from the graveyard after the burial.  He did kind of appreciate the fact that he’d been left alone for that awful bit, and had been able to have a short breakdown at his parents’ burial plot in peace.  Now that it was time to pick himself up by the bootstraps, of course it was Bucky who would meet him at the threshold of it all.

Steve had every intention of turning down his best friend’s offer to move in with his family… while he had no idea how he was going to afford to live on his own, not when he had to make rent and pay for medicines and food by himself, Steve also wasn’t about to take charity - not even from the Barneses, who were practically family to him as well.  And yet, when Bucky brought it up so casually, making it sound like it was no big deal, like George and Winnie had room and board enough for one more adult, giving Steve his crooked little smile as he tried to talk him into it… Steve felt his defenses crumbling.

And then Buck reached over casual as anything and squeezed his shoulder, and promised him forever, and Steve had no choice but to say okay.  And to recognize, with a sick little twist of his guts, that he absolutely loved this man.  Not like a friend, not like a brother: he loved every bit of Bucky, heart and soul, in a way that he’d probably never love anyone again.  It was a terrifying realization, but one that saved him from the despair that he hadn’t even realized he was starting to fall into.  Because just when Steve had thought he was well and truly alone in the world, Bucky had stood up and reminded him that they still had each other, at least.

As long as that was the case, Steve could continue to fight another day… even if he had to keep that awful (wonderful, terrifying, beautiful) truth to himself.


	7. Important

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Another anonymous prompt that I got from Tumblr - I decided to set this one in the Trainer!Bucky verse, and might end up working it into later chapters, but for now imagine that it falls between the next two chapters of "Firsts". Prompt: Send me an "Important" and I'll write a drabble about one character explaining why the other is so important to them

It had been nearly an hour since Bucky had shown up at Steve’s door with a gift of rice milk ice cream (one that one of the dieticians at the gym had sworn was a halfway decent substitute for the real thing, which he’d confirmed to be the case before bringing over a few pints of it for the both of them to enjoy during their planned movie night-in), and Steve was still kicking around the first thought that had entered into his incredulous mind.  He glanced sideways, catching a glimpse of Bucky as he reclined on the massive pile of pillows behind them, still completely enthralled with the movie - so much so that he didn’t seem to notice the tiny dab of chocolate ice cream that was still drying in the corner of his mouth.  Still, despite his concentration on the screen, the fingers of Bucky’s left hand continued to trace idle, soft patterns along the outside of Steve’s arm, while his own arm draped heavy and warm across Steve’s shoulders.

Steve continued watching as the light from his laptop screen flickered different colored lights across his face, highlighting the strength of his jaw and the sharpness of his cheekbones and the gorgeous way his eyes could change colors even in normal lighting, and as usual he was taken aback by Bucky’s beauty.  Combine that with how kind he was, how sweet and attentive of a boyfriend he just kept proving himself to be, how smart and athletic and fucking _perfect_ he consistently seemed, and the next thing Steve knew the words that had been brewing in his head all night suddenly blurted out of his mouth.

“What the fuck did I ever do to deserve you, Buck?”

For a second the only answer that he got was Neil Degrasse Tyson going on about relativity and a tiny, confused smile from Bucky - but as Buck turned to look at him a tiny frownline formed between his eyebrows.  Whatever it was that had ended up written on Steve’s face was enough for him to hit pause on the laptop, before asking incredulously, “What, seriously?”

Steve felt his cheeks flush spectacularly, immediately regretting having brought it up, especially when they were enjoying such a nice, quiet night together.  God knew that they’d both been so busy of late, between Steve’s classes wrapping up for the year and Bucky working ridiculous hours at the gym as he tried to save up as much as he could before his own classes started in July, that Steve really should have just kept his mouth shut and enjoyed the evening.  All the same, once he’d started thinking about their situation, he couldn’t very well _stop_ \- especially now that his brain was going so far as to remind him of all of the times that he’d caught people checking Bucky out, either at the gym or on the street, and how their eyes would inevitably drift towards him with looks of confusion.  Because really, Bucky was damned near perfect, and could have had any guy in Brooklyn on his arm if he wanted.  And he’d picked… Steve.

“Just, I mean…” Steve sighed, sliding out from under Bucky’s arm and flicking the lamp on his nightstand on, “I’m not complaining, obviously.  I just don’t really understand how I’m worth all this.”  He gestured furtively towards the empty carton of ice cream next to the bed, but hoped that Bucky would get his meaning: it wasn’t just about the stupid ice cream or the cuddles, it was every other little thing that Bucky had done for him during their months together, from the help at the gym to the dates to the dumb little text messages that never failed to make Steve smile, no matter how overwhelmed he was by projects and deadlines.

Bucky blinked at him in surprise, before letting out a long, drawn-out sigh.  Steve felt guilty as hell as he watched his boyfriend scrub at his hair for a moment, and was about to ask him to just forget it, when Bucky shifted so that he was facing Steve completely and grabbed his chin gently, tipping it so that Steve was staring into his eyes.  

“Alright then,” he sighed, “‘msorry I didn’t make this clearer earlier…”

“You didn’t,” Steve protested, interrupting him to point out that Bucky hadn’t done anything wrong, but Bucky shushed him gently and continued.

“No, I must’ve, if you still don’t know how crazy I am for you,” he argued with a sad smile, licking his lips and taking a deep breath before he continued.  “Listen, Steve… I don’t know who the hell you’ve dated in the past and I’m not gonna make you talk about it if you don’t want to, but as far as I’m concerned, this kind of stuff is what you do if you’re dating someone and you care about them.  That’s the whole point of dating - spending time with someone you like and doing things they enjoy and finding common interests and sharing them.”

“I know that, Bucky,” Steve muttered, unable to bring himself to really meet his eyes.  “But that still doesn’t explain…”  he trailed off, not wanting to embarrass either of them with the rest of his train of thought.

“Because I was drawn to you the second I saw you that first day at the Red Room,” Bucky answered after a long moment of silence.  “Cuz you’re fuckin’ gorgeous,” he continued with a soft smile, tipping Steve’s chin up again, “and your tenacious, and you’re funny, and you don’t take shit from anyone.  And you’re so damned strong, Steve.”

Before he could continue his thought Steve scoffed incredulously; yes, he was still making reasonable progress at the gym, and felt almost like a normal human being now when it came to being able to walk around the city and haul groceries back from the bodega closest to his apartment, but calling him strong, especially when Bucky was such a specimen himself, was just ridiculous.  Steve still struggled to press an Olympic bar more than a couple of times on a good day at the Red Room, while Bucky could easily bench press at least one and a half Steve’s - probably two if he really tried.

“You are,” Bucky sighed, again derailing Steve’s train of thought.  After a second’s hesitation he tapped the center of Steve’s chest gently, where they both knew that the tattoos covering his sternotomy scar fanned out underneath his t-shirt.  “There aren’t many people who could even survive all the shit you’ve been through, and now you’re thriving - _that’s_ strength, babe.  And you’re so brave, and you work so hard,” his voice trailed off again, before he shook his head and gave Steve a sad smile.  “I just, I wish you could see yourself the way I see you.  The way all of us who know you see you, Steve.  And I know I take more risks cuz I’ve been around you, and I feel like I’m a better person every day just for knowing you… far as I’m concerned, _I’m_ the lucky one here.”

Steve blinked as Bucky finally finished his rant, horrified to realize that his eyes were welling up with tears.  Hard as they were to believe, there was no doubt in his mind that Bucky’s words were sincere - which made them hit Steve that much harder.  They still hadn’t said the L word to each other, not explicitly just yet, but between his words then and everything else he’d done for Steve in their time together Bucky was making his feelings pretty obvious. 

While Steve absolutely felt the same way, it was overwhelming all the same.

“So yeah,” Bucky continued awkwardly, shrugging and settling back against the pillows as Steve continued to stare at him.  “You’ve been Steve Rogers, that’s what you did to deserve me.”

There was no way that Steve was talking after that - if he opened his mouth, he knew he’d do nothing but blubber and embarrass them both further, so he did the only thing he could think of that would be an adequate response to Bucky’s answer.  He grabbed the laptop and carefully moved it to the foot of the bed on his side, then crawled into Bucky’s lap, pulling him into an urgent, hot kiss.

He couldn’t verbalize how much he loved Bucky, not just yet - but he could sure as hell show him.


	8. Congratulations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Another prompt from tumblr, because I've been struggling like crazy to write anything else: Send me a "Congrats" and I'll write a drabble about their first anniversary
> 
> I’m playing with the timeline a little, and decided to go with an MCU-verse where CW (or at least the end of it) didn’t happen. Bucky remembers an important anniversary, but is having trouble with some of the farther reaching details. Steve decides to propose making a new anniversary for both of them.

Steve was half-way through the front door of the apartment, take-out bags in hand and taking a breath to call to let Bucky know he was home, when the smell hit him.  It had been so long since Steve’d had someone to come home to that it had taken a while to get used to Bucky’s presence again, but in the months since his friend had come in from the cold and actually agreed to start living in Steve’s custody, they’d finally started working out a peaceful, almost comfortable, cohabitation.  Usually it meant Steve coming home to hear Bucky’s music (a weird, modern take on their old standards called ‘electro swing’ that Buck was totally obsessed with) playing from the stereo in his room, or one of his space documentaries playing on the TV in the living room while Bucky dosed on the couch.  While it was completely foreign to anything that they’d experienced in their past life together, it was still so much better than the loneliness that Steve had to deal with when he first came out of the ice that he welcomed it with open arms.

Today, though, he was met by something completely different: the Glenn Miller that was blasting in the living room had to have been coming from the gramophone, and the smell… Steve could have recognized the smell of boiling cabbage from a mile away, even if it had been nearly three-quarters of a century since he’d smelled it last.  He paused in the entryway of the apartment - their huge, modern, Manhattan apartment that Steve had leased in 2015, barely keeping his head from spinning over the juxtaposition of smells and sounds that easily could have been Brooklyn in 1942.

With a shake of his head Steve pulled himself together, shutting the door behind him and calling out, “Hey Buck - I’m home!” as he toed his shoes off next to the door.  They both made a habit of announcing themselves when they came up on the other now: in the past they might have sneaked up on one another or simply expected the the other to know exactly who was coming through the door.  Unfortunately, given their most recent history, neither could exactly be trusted to respond favorably to surprises anymore.

“Just hold on a second!” Bucky called from the kitchen, sounding harried.  “I need… ten more minutes before you come in the kitchen.”

“Uh,” Steve answered, glancing down at the bags of Thai food in his hands.  At least it all would keep, given how much more reliable their refrigerator was than any sad ice box they had owned before.  “Okay, I’ll just; be out here,” he finished lamely, dropping the parcels onto the coffee table and falling onto his side of the couch in the living room.

With the music going and the sounds coming from the kitchen Steve didn’t really want to turn the TV on - if anything he had half a mind to grab one of his largely empty sketchbooks off of the mantle, to have something to do with his hands for old times sake.  After a couple of seconds worth of debate he decided against it, and instead just relaxed back into the couch cushions, closing his eyes and reveling in the familiar sounds and smells that washed over him.  The loud clang of a pan and Bucky’s muffled curse that followed didn’t even startle him: Steve was usually jumpier than he really liked to admit when it came to loud, surprising sounds, but all he could was smile softly and the reminder that Bucky was probably still just as hopeless in the kitchen as he’d always been.  

The fire alarm that went off a few seconds later only confirmed that thought, but considering that it was off before Steve could even pull himself off of the couch he figured that it wasn’t anything that was likely to cause too much damage.

“Alright,” Bucky sighed, his voice suddenly considerably closer - Steve glanced up from his spot on the couch to find his friend standing in the doorway of the kitchen, twisting his fingers nervously in a kitchen towel.  Bucky’s hair was a little more trimmed than it had been when he’d first come in from being on the run, but now it was flying frizzy and wild around his face.  “I, uh… I made dinner.  If you want it,” he added nervously, apparently missing the fact that the fabric between his metal fingers was splintering and fraying as he spoke.  “Some of your old favorites, I think.  But, um -” his eyes drifted to the bags on the table and his shoulders sank minutely “if you’d rather have the takeout that’s fine too.”

“Nah,” Steve insisted right away, scooping up the offending bags before they could cause any further hurt feelings, “they’re all noodles and rice dishes - they’ll heat up fine some other time.”  Whatever Buck had been cooking in the kitchen must have already been moved to their tiny dining room: all that was left when Steve shoved his bags in the refrigerator was a few empty pots and the smouldering frying pan that looked to have offended the fire alarm (which he noticed with a sigh had been ripped off of the ceiling).

“It’s better to have home-cooking fresh, anyway,” Steve continued, smiling as he made his way into the adjacent room.  He stopped in the doorway, gaping at the sight that greeted him: the tiny, sad table he’d found to fit in the nook of a room was covered in a white tablecloth that Steve didn’t remember owning, with a pair of the weird jarred candles that Nat had insisted on buying for his last birthday lit in the center.  Around them sat a huge mixing bowl full of colcannon, a tureen of mushy peas, and a plate full of slightly-charred spam pieces next to a pan of what Steve was guessing was applesauce cake.

Bucky carefully avoided his eyes as he took his usual seat at the table and began filling his plate unceremoniously.  After swallowing painfully around the lump that had suddenly found itself in his throat, Steve did the same.

They ate in silence for a full minute before Steve got up the nerve to address the elephant in the room.  “This is all great, Buck,” he said with a smile around a mouthful of salty peas, “but, uh… what’s the occasion?”

“Anniversary,” Bucky responded as he shoveled another bite of potatoes into his mouth.  “I thought I’d make your favorites.”  He was in the middle of using the side of his fork to saw through a piece of Spam when he looked up through his eyelashes at Steve, looking remarkably young and vulnerable.  “Er - if I got ‘em right?”

“I mean… I preferred chip steaks to Spam,” Steve answered automatically, his brain still stuck on Bucky’s initial answer to realize his fuck up until it was too late.  His heart dropped almost as fast as the look on Bucky’s face did.  “But fried Spam was my second favorite, and this is great, Buck.”  

Bucky shook his head like it was nothing but didn’t look up from his plate again.  In the living room, Glenn Miller decided to make life extra hard for the both of them as the record cut out, leaving them both in awkward silence.

“What, uh,” Steve started once the sound of the ticking of the clock on the wall of his bedroom got to be too much.  “What anniversary are we celebrating?”

It took a few seconds for Bucky to finally look up, and he made sure to take a drink of the red Koolaid in his glass before answering.  “Well, it’s the fifth of April, right?”  Steve nodded in agreement.  “And I read somewhere that the Barnes family moved to Brooklyn at the end of March when George got an offer to start driving delivery trucks for a friend of the family.”  

Steve swallowed thickly - as much as he hated when Bucky talked in third person about his past, it was always a special treat to see him remembering things from before.  “Yeah,” he muttered quietly, “yeah, that’s right.”

“The way I remember it,” Bucky continued, turning his attention to his plate again, “it was about a week after we first moved that I found some skinny punk gettin’ beat up in an alley off of Bushwick and I stepped in to help him out.  So I figured…”

He trailed off, holding up the open palm of his left hand and using it to gesture to the food on the table.  Steve stared in silence like a big dumb mook, too overcome with emotion to even think of a response.

“Sorry, ‘sdumb.”  Bucky added under his breath a few seconds later, before picking up his fork again and pushing the food that was still left around his plate.

“It’s not,” Steve forced himself to choke out as he carefully set his own fork down, pointedly ignoring the way that it had bent in his hand from his grip.  “It’s… it’s the nicest thing anybody’s done in a long, long time for me.  Thanks, Buck.”

After a long beat Bucky looked up and gave him an obviously forced smile - but he also went back to his dinner, so Steve figured that he’d given the right answer for a change.  He forced himself to go back to eating as well, trying his best to enjoy the old familiar foods as his stomach tried its best to rebel against him.

They’d both made their way through most of the food on the table before Bucky started looking like he wanted to speak again.  Steve, unfortunately, was too big of a coward to actually encourage it, especially considering how shook he still felt by their earlier conversation.  He was in the middle of cutting into the cake when Bucky finally spoke up.

“I’ve been remembering a decent bit lately,” he started quietly, frowning at his empty plate and then dragging his eyes up to meet Steve’s.  “I mean, about… before.”

“That’s good?” Steve breathed after a couple of seconds of tense silence.

Bucky shrugged, passing his plate over for the piece of cake that Steve had dug out of the pan.  “Were we -” he started as he set the plate down, making no move to actually eat it.  “I mean, things are awful jumbled, so I can’t always…”

“It’s alright,” Steve prompted quietly when Bucky made no move to continue on after trailing off.

“Just - were we ever - more?  Than friends?”

“You were my family, Buck,” Steve answered immediately.  “You were the best friend anyone could ever ask for; after my ma died, you were my whole damned world.”

Bucky rubbed his jaw, chuckling sadly.  “I knew that part already,” he sighed.  “But I remember… wanting.  And then I remember other things, but I can’t really separate what was real and what was dreams in my head just yet.”

He looked up and finally made eye contact with Steve as he finished speaking, tilting his chin up defiantly.  Steve knew that look all-too-well; it was the same challenging look he gave someone when he admitted to memories of his time as the Soldier, the one that was supposed to protect him as he waited for the fallout from it.

What he’d said had definitely rocked Steve, but not for the reasons he was probably expecting.

“Oh,” he finally said stupidly, his voice weak as he put together Bucky’s meaning.  “I mean, no.  We never… we were best friends, and we lived together for a while, but we were never - er - romantic with each other.”

Bucky nodded again, staring at a spot on the tablecloth as he chewed the inside of his cheek.  Steve tried to wrap his head around everything that had happened since he’d come home, while simultaneously trying to hold himself together and not start laughing (or crying) hysterically over the whole situation.  It was amazing - for as different as they both were, after all of the shit that had happened to them over the years - that they were still so damned similar to the idiots that they always had been.

“But,” Steve added after at least an eternity of silence, toying with the bite of apple cake that he still hadn’t managed to actually put in his mouth, “that doesn’t mean that I didn’t want, too.”

Bucky blinked silently for a few moments, before looking up at Steve with guarded eyes.

“Cuz, uh… if you’re sayin’ what I think you’re saying, the feeling was always mutual.  We must’ve just both been too dumb to say anything about it.”

Bucky laughed, a harsh, biting sound in the otherwise quiet of the room.   “That I believe.”

Steve chuckled as well, although his was considerably more self-deprecating.  He finally forced himself to eat again, marveling for a second over how similar the cake was to what he always remembered Bucky baking for his birthday.  He didn’t really want to think about the implications of his friend remembering something as inconsequential as a cake recipe over all these years.

“But y’know,” he heard himself saying a second later, “for all we’re always saying that neither of us are the same guys we were before, times have changed a hell of a lot, too.”  Bucky was staring at him with such intensity that Steve felt his heart pounding in his chest, beating so erratically that he half-worried that his damned arrhythmia was finding a way to defeat the serum that had kept it in check for so long.  “And, uh… if we’re being perfectly honest with each other, I still want.”

The silence that stretched out between them was a palpable presence as Steve did his best to hold eye-contact with Bucky, despite how intense his friend’s gaze had suddenly become.  

“You want,” Bucky asked skeptically, “even though I’m… this?” He used his right hand to gesture to himself this time, starting pointedly with the shoulder of his metal arm.  

“I’m not that scrawny little punk you wanted either,” Steve responded firmly, “but if the feeling’s mutual, then why not?”

Bucky couldn’t come up with an argument for that, apparently - that, or he was just as dumbfounded as Steve was feeling.  For all of the things that he could have hoped might have eventually happened between them, this was easily the last thing.  And even though it was damned terrifying to think of adding one more thing to their already complicated relationship, he was dead honest when he admitted that he definitely still wanted Bucky; even (or maybe especially) this new version that sat in front of him today.

“So whatdya say,” Steve finally mustered up the courage to say, sitting back with a smirk that he hoped looked far more confident than he actually felt.  “Why don’t we get to the part where we celebrate our anniversary properly - just leave the dishes to take care of in the morning and spend the night necking on the couch with some bad Netflix on TV.”

Bucky scoffed and ran a hand through his hair, watching Steve closely all the while.  Apparently he caught on to the fact that Steve was being entirely serious, because his smile suddenly turned considerably warmer.  “That sounds swell, pal,” he drawled out slowly, sending a chill down Steve’s spine as he slid out of his seat and held his hand out for Steve to take and follow.

It turned out that it was.


	9. Meet Ugly: Raining in Brooklyn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This was from a prompt request on tumblr, wherein @sproings gave me the starter "A cold rainy night in Brooklyn, Bucky needs to get home, but there’s this guy, soaking wet, trying to rescue a kitten …"

Bucky shrugged his shoulders, burying his nose deeper into the collar of his jacket and clenching his right fist in his pocket, trying his best to control his shivers.  While the thick, quilted pea coat he’d bought on returning to New York for good was usually capable of fending off even the most biting windchills, he was sincerely regretting not having an umbrella with him, as the rain continued to beat down on his head and run down his neck, chilling him to the bone.  Luckily, his apartment was only a block and a half away, now - he did his best to ignore the continued freezing drizzle soaking down his back, instead imagining the hot shower and stupid fluffy pajamas (a gag gift from his kid sister that had turned out to be one of his most guilty pleasures) he’d be wrapping himself in within the next ten minutes.

Bucky turned the corner down Flatbush, picking up the pace as he knew that home was within sight… he’d later realize that he’d practically jogged past the alleyway closest to his building, making it exceedingly odd for him to have noticed the small form struggling next to the dumpster.  But he had caught a glimpse of the obnoxious jacket in the dim light of the alleyway, and had paused just long enough to make sure that it wasn’t anything too suspicious (while his therapist continued to be impressed by the leaps and bounds that Bucky was making in acclimating to civilian life, there were certain paranoias that he couldn’t quite shake, not after so many watches… not after how horrifically wrong his last one had gone).

It was a single form moving in the alley, at least, one that looked positively tiny, dwarfed by what looked to be a varsity-style jacket with a huge red, white and blue target on the back.  Bucky groaned as his eyes focused better through the sheet of rain, recognizing that the person very well could be a kid - a kid who really shouldn’t be out alone at this hour of night in the city anyway, much less a night when the biblical flood seemed to be making a comeback and the temperature was slotted to drop well below freezing.

“Hey!” he called out, pausing to make sure that his left cuff was tucked into his jacket pocket, to at least afford him some level of normalcy, before squaring his shoulders and marching into the alley as well.  “Hey, you alright down there?!”

Instead of answering the guy continued to strain up on his toes, flailing towards the fire-escape above him, occasionally tossing something at it.  As Bucky approached further, he was surprised by how low and deep the voice coming out of the kid sounded.

“C’mon… just, come down!” The stranger called, still so focused on the seemingly empty balcony above him that he didn’t seem to notice Bucky approaching.  “I can catch you, I swear.  Jus…. c’mon, you lil' shit.”

It was the last line that had Bucky looking more closely at the balcony above; within a few more paces, he was close enough to make out the tiny ball of orange fur that was huddled next to the railing.

“Hey,” Bucky said again, reaching out and touching the kid’s shoulder as he came to a stop.

The little guy whirled around in an instant, his fists immediately raising into a fighting stance - Bucky heard a faint hiss, and for a second had to wonder if it was coming from the tiny blond or from the kitten above them.  “Woah!” Bucky called out, raising his right hand in a sign of surrender, “I just wanted to see if you needed help…”

“Well I don’t,” the kid retorted immediately, frowning heavily as he kept his hands in a sad-approximation of protecting his face.  “And I don’t got any money, either, so you can buzz off.”

Bucky did take a step back, surprised by the vehemence in his voice, but before he could feel too offended by it he noticed two things: one, that the kid didn’t seem to be much of a kid at all; between his voice and the shape of his face Bucky had to guess that he was more likely in his mid-twenties, if not closer to Bucky’s own age.  The second was that he was cute as hell - even if he did look and act like a drowned cat.  “How long’ve you been out here?” he ended up asking after a few seconds of silence, after the guy had finally started to drop his guard and look towards the fire escape again.

“Bout an hour,” the guy admitted gloomily, teeth chattering as he finally dropped his hands and turned back towards the escape.  “I live a few units over and heard the thing crying, but the neighbors who own the apartment he’s outside of haven’t been home in days… I just wanna get him in out of the cold.”

“You didn’t call the fire department or anything?” Bucky asked.

The look the guy gave him immediately made Bucky feel six inches tall.  “They’ve got better shit to do, pal, especially on a night like this.  And besides, if they did come they’d probably just take the thing in to a shelter; you know what they do to feral cats.”

Bucky didn’t know, actually, but he had to assume it was bad by the murderous way the stranger said it.

“You think it’ll let you grab it?” Bucky asked, after surveying the fire escape again.

“I’d have to get up there in the first place to try, wouldn’t I?”  Tiny Blond responded testily.  

And that - that was the final straw for Bucky.  Because while he could understand that the guy was cold and wet and frustrated, Buck was in the same boat - and he really was only trying to help.  After a second’s hesitation Bucky again removed his right hand from his jacket pocket, jumping up as high as he could and grabbing a hold of the old metal ladder that was suspended from the bottom of the balcony.  It creaked as he pulled it down, holding it in place and shooting tiny blond a deadpan look of his own.

The guy gaped at him for a second, before muttering something along the lines of “Must be nice to be tall,” as he started up the ladder himself.  

Bucky couldn’t help feeling a tiny-bit grateful as the stranger scurried up the ladder: partly because it spared him the awkwardness of trying to shimmy up the wet, narrow rungs one-handedly, and partly because it afforded him with a spectacular view of the stranger’s ass in wet, well-fitted skinny jeans as he made his way up to the first-floor balcony.  There was another loud hiss and a brief struggle as the guy attempted to scoop the soaked kitten into his coat, but apparently once it realized that it was dry and warm the animal gave up its battle, allowing Tiny Blond to climb back down to the ground level.

“Uh, thanks,” Tiny Blond muttered awkwardly once Bucky had let the ladder swing back into position.  “Sorry I was so short earlier; usually when a big guy approaches me in a dark alley it’s to steal my shit, and I was already havin’ a pretty crappy night.”

“It’s cool,” Bucky responded easily, using their temporary truce to appreciate how ridiculously long Tiny Blond’s eyelashes were when he looked bashfully at his boots like that.  “I, uh - I can see how that could get your guard up.  Especially if you didn’t hear me ahead of time.”

“Oh, yeah,” Tiny Blond admitted, tapping the bright blue hearing aid in his right ear.  “This thing doesn’t work worth a shit out here between the sound of the rain and the street traffic.”

Bucky nodded, rocking awkwardly back on his heels as he tried to come up with a response.

“I’m Steve, by the way,” Tiny Blond spoke up a second later, extending his left hand as his right was still clutching at the kitten-shaped lump in the front of his jacket.

“Er, Bucky,” Bucky responded, extending his right hand and trying his best to shake the offered hand, despite the awkwardness of it.  He caught Steve’s eyes flicker to Bucky’s left sleeve, which was obviously empty if one took a moment to look at it.

“Nice to meet ya,” Steve said, his eyes immediately tracking back to Bucky’s face without a trace of the pity that Buck was all-too-used to seeing.  Instead, they seemed to be considering, especially as they tracked up and down the rest of his body.

“I, uh… I’m right upstairs, if you wanted to come in and get a cup of coffee or somethin’ to warm up?” Steve finally continued.  “Just - if you want.  I figure it’s the least I can do, with you stoppin’ out here and freezing to help us.”

Bucky was torn - he was only 3 buildings down from the shower he’d been dreaming about, but at the same time he couldn’t ignore the voice in his head that was screaming the reminder that he’d not been on a date since coming home… and he’d just met a hot stranger that was practically a neighbor.  A neighbor with a sassy attitude and a penchant for rescuing stray kittens, apparently.

His mouth was answering before his brain could even catch up.  “Thanks… but I was already soaked before I saw you here, and I don’t wanna drip all over your apartment.”

The way Steve’s face sank shouldn’t have lifted Bucky’s spirits the way that it did, but the idea that he actually  _ wanted _ Bucky to come upstairs with him was a heady one all the same.

“But,” he continued immediately, “my place is just around the corner - I can go change into something a little less miserable and run back?”

This time, Steve’s face lit up just as quickly as it had fell, and damn-near knocked Bucky’s breath away with how gorgeous his smile was.  “Yeah!  Yeah, that’d… that’d be awesome, Bucky.”

“Right.  Alright!” Bucky responded, feeling like an idiot as he nodded and turned on his heel.  “I’ll, uh - I’ll just ring when I get back.  Which unit is yours?”

“4F,” Steve answered, following him out of the alleyway, “I’ll go dry up too.  Oh!  Do you have any milk?”

“Yeah, probably,” Bucky nodded, hoping that the quart he’d noticed in the back of the fridge this morning hadn’t gone off yet.

“Think you could bring it by for this little guy?  I don’t have any dairy in the house.”

“Sure, no problem,” Bucky said immediately, already deciding that if worse came to worse he could pop into the bodega between their buildings on the way back.  “I’ll be back in a few minutes,” he added as he jogged away in earnest.

“See you soon, Buck!” He heard Steve call over the sound of traffic, making Bucky grin like an idiot despite the way his boots were kicking cold water up the backs of his jean legs.  It was crazy, he knew, to think that anything would come from such a weird first meeting: but at the same time he couldn’t help feeling excited for what was to come.


	10. Making Friends

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The lovely @whtaft (mambo) gave me the starter prompt "I don't need you, really." I decided the world didn't have enough baby!Stucky cuteness, yet.

“I don’t need you, really,” Steve grumbled, wiping at the blood that was running from his nostrils and hoping like hell that it hadn’t gotten a chance to stain his shirt - his ma would skin him alive if he ruined _another_ one, especially this early in the school year.

The new boy - Bucky, he’d asked to be called in his weird midwestern accent - just smiled his disturbingly friendly smile as he handed over a dingy-looking handkerchief.  He, of course, had come out of the scuffle without any major signs of it; but then he’d also come in late, once the MacInnis boys were already beating the hell out of Steve.  And just like he had earlier in the week, the new boy in town had done what no one else in any of the surrounding neighborhoods had bothered to do in all of Steve’s nine years of life: he’d stepped in and hollered at the bullies Steve was fighting, and ultimately ended up driving the little bastards away.

If it’d been anyone else Steve would have figured he was trying to get one over on him, and probably would have challenged the country boy to a fight himself (one that, admittedly, he’d probably get his ass kicked during).  But this new guy, he never seemed to look down on Steve, not even when he was picking him up out of a puddle behind the automat on Bushwick.  He just… told whatever bullies were beating on Steve that day to buzz off, then gave him a hand and tried to make small talk as Steve tried to make his way back home.

Today didn’t seem to be any different.

“I know ya don’t,” Bucky responded, still smiling his familiar, pleasant smile, not even rolling his eyes at the implication that Steve could have stood a chance against the pair of considerably bigger boys.  “But like I told you before, that don’t mean I ain’t gonna help out when I see an unfair fight.”

Steve sighed, finally accepting the fabric square from Bucky’s outstretched hand and using it to daub at his nose.  There didn’t seem to be any point in trying to get rid of the guy; Bucky seemed damned near as stubborn as Steve could be, and it wasn’t as if he’d given Steve a good reason to be mean with him.

“What was it about this time?”  Bucky asked after a few moments silence.

“They wouldn’t leave Emil Whittaker alone - kept callin’ him Tiny Tim since he started walkin’ with that crutch,” Steve muttered testily, already feeling his blood boil when he thought about it.  It was bad enough when bullies teased him for his own health problems, but taunting a kid who had survived polio was cheap, even for them.

“Well,” Bucky responded with a frown, “at least they had it comin’, then.”  Steve chuckled humorlessly, glad that he wasn’t getting any more flack for the fight, at least.  “Anyway,” Bucky added, “My ma promised me cinnamon toast when I got home today, what’d’ya say you come back to my place, we can split it?”  Before Steve could answer Bucky barreled right along, “And she should be so busy with the baby that we can get you cleaned up, too.  Before your ma knows you got in another fight.”

Steve was so surprised that Bucky had noticed his ma’s silent disappointment in the short time he’d met her that he didn’t come up with a response before Buck had thrown an arm over his shoulder and started steering him out of the alleyway, as if he’d already happily agreed.

“Hey!” He exclaimed, ducking out from under the larger boys arm and pushing him away with a scowl.  “I said I can get by on my own, okay?  I don’t need anyone babyin’ me.”

“I ain’t tryin’ to baby you, Steve,” Bucky responded with a frown, shoving his hands awkwardly in his pockets as he regrouped from the shove.  “And I ain’t sayin’ ya’ need me, either.  I’m just sayin’…” he sighed, chewing on his lower lip for a second and scuffing a warn-out toe against the cobblestone.  “I wanna be yer friend, that’s all.  So even if you don’t need me, you got me anyways.”

He ended his little speech with a shrug and stared at his shoes some more, while Steve stood across from him gaping like an idiot.  No one had ever asked to be his friend, not really, and certainly not someone like Bucky Barnes - who was new and big for his age and seemed to come from money, and so probably could’ve had his pick of any of the other kids in the neighborhood for a friend.  The idea that he was awkwardly asking Steve, of all people, threw him completely for a loop.

“Sorry, I’ll leave ya alone,” Bucky continued a few moments later, turning with his head down and moping the rest of the way out of the alley.

“Hey, Buck - wait up!” Steve finally called out, barely recovering his wits before Bucky had walked away for good.  He jogged as well as he could the few steps to catch up with him, feeling just as uncomfortable with the whole ordeal as Bucky looked.  “I uh, I’m sorry for actin’ like a jerk,” he started, swallowing his pride along with the wheeze he felt building in his chest.  “I’m not very good at havin’ friends, but uh… if the offer still stands?”  He straightened his chin and looked up at Bucky, doing his best not to look like he was begging.

The grin he got in return was blinding.

“Course it does,” Bucky laughed, bumping their shoulders together before starting off towards Park Slope, with a notable swagger in his step.

Steve smiled as well, checking quickly in a passing storefront to make sure he’d wiped the worst of the gore off of his face.  He wanted to strut a little as well, being able to walk alongside a friend and all, and didn’t want to wreck the whole image by looking like a nut.


	11. Sexting 101, or: How Steve and Bucky FINALLY Figured Their Shit Out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Inspired by [This (stupidly adorable) Post](http://0n-y0ur-left.tumblr.com/post/155923029136/shanology-faith-food-fashion-prepfordwife) on tumblr, which @machine-dove messaged me yelling about my tags and saying that I had to write a ficlet on.
> 
> I'm always a slut for prompts ;)

The thing was, Steve would swear in the years that followed, he really felt like him and Bucky had been dancing around this for months.  They’d been best friends for years, for as far back as either of them could remember, but after the weirdness that had been middle school there’d been a charge there, a spark of  _ something _ humming beneath the surface of their interactions that both excited and scared the hell out of them.  

Or out of Steve, anyway.  He’d finally gotten the nerve to admit - to himself and his friends and loved ones - that he had a thing for both girls and guys at the start of eleventh grade, and while he didn’t have dates of either sex lining up to ask him out, it had at least cleared the air between him and Bucky.  And when Buck had broken up with his last girl of the month, four months ago (not that Steve was keeping track), and they’d started constantly hanging out together again, like old times… well, there was a nasty little voice in Steve’s head that couldn’t help reading more into it.

Especially when Bucky insisted sharing milk shakes when they went out after school, or popcorn when they went to the movies, or letting Steve borrow his Varsity jacket when he accidentally/on purpose forgot to bring his own coat to the Homecoming game they’d gone stag to.  There was definitely something there, something more than Steve had ever dreamed of hoping for - but while one mean side of him liked to point out the possibility of his best friend becoming something even more, the other, meaner side always shut him down: making sure to remind Steve as harshly as possible just how delusional he was being.

Because Bucky, even if he was single, had never once expressed an interest in being with other guys.  And even if he had, Buck was so far out of Steve’s league that it wasn’t funny.  He was smart - honor council this year, top of their class since he’d first transferred to Brooklyn in elementary school - he was on student council, starting pitcher for the varsity baseball team as  a sophomore, a key player in every drama production Washington High had put on since he’d started there.  People were tripping over the opportunity to hang out with Bucky Barnes, never mind the chance to date him.  And Steve… Steve was just Steve.  Scrawny asthmatic with a chip on his shoulder, painfully average student and GSA representative.  He was a decent artist when people took the time to actually look at his work, and Bucky swore up and down that he was funny as hell, but for the most part Steve knew that the only reason he wasn’t regularly getting shoved in lockers anymore was because he was most famous for being Bucky Barnes’ best friend.

Steve was an idiot for even imagining that he had a chance with someone as perfect as Bucky, but he wasn’t so stupid that he’d go and risk something as important as their friendship by asking him out.

Besides, they hung out so often that Steve felt he could pretty safely pretend they were dating.  In the deepest, darkest corners of his mind.  And if ninety-nine percent of his schmoopy fan art of late was based on an AU of Clark Kent and Bruce Wayne as dorky high school boyfriends that maybe bore a little bit of a resemblance to the dumb shit that the two of them did together?  Well… no one needed to know.

It got more hits to his Tumblr page, at least.

That said, there were still nights when Steve’s stupid brain couldn’t help but wish.  So when Bucky had sent his text on the Sunday before the MLK Holiday, when Steve was already pouting about the fact that he couldn’t join him in their volunteer plans because his stupid head had decided to come down with a stupid cold, well… Steve couldn’t help feeling a little reckless.

**Text from Bucky Received 09:32 PM**

_ What do you wear to bed? _

Steve had been staring at it for a solid thirty seconds, blinking and trying to convince himself that it really wasn’t the Nyquil that he’d taken earlier - that Bucky really was asking him  _ that _ question.

He  _ had _ to know how suggestive it was.  Steve had watched Bucky charm girls since they were in elementary school… he knew how to flirt, he knew how people took his words.  Which meant - he had to be flirting with Steve.  It wasn’t completely out of the blue, not really, but it still left Steve such a squirmy mess that he actually had to abandon his tablet on his desk and fall back onto his mattress to read it again.

Bucky had stayed over enough times over the years to know damned well that Steve usually just slept in whatever outsized summer camp t-shirt was cleanest in his drawer and either a pair of old boxers or ratty pajama pants; but he couldn’t very well say that.  Not in response to his first sext.

He bit the hell out of his lip, dismissing the thought as fast as he could, before  finally forcing his fingers to type out an answer.  

**Text to Bucky Sent 9:34 PM**

_ depends on the weather _

_ if its summer just a black jock or smth ;) _

He held his breath as the ellipses bubble appeared on Bucky’s side of the screen, rereading his response obsessively.  Best case scenario: Bucky really was flirting with him, and they could get it out of their systems the easy way… break the ice on a text screen, then make out like fiends in person the next time they hung out together.  Worst case scenario: Bucky would ask him what the fuck he was talking about and Steve would laugh it off as a joke.

He was golden.

He was really, really fucking hoping for the former - although as Bucky continued typing he couldn’t help but start panicking.

**Text from Bucky Received 9:35 PM**

_ k but what about like in the winter _

_ do u wear warm pajamas? _

What the fuck?

Steve actually started to type as much, but the rest of Bucky’s responses came in a flurry of messages.

**Text from Bucky Received 9:35 PM**

_ my mom is making me throw out my old superman pajamas and i kno theyre about ur size _

_ i swear theyre not gross or anything _

_ ill wash them before _

_ if u want them _

_ i just know u like superman and its dumb to throw them away _

Steve finished reading the texts, dropped the phone onto his comforter, and covered his face in his hands because - oh God.  It was so painfully cute, so painfully Buck that he couldn’t help giggling, and immediately picked the phone back up to read the exchange again.

Before he could talk himself out of it, he took a screenshot and hit the share icon for his Tumblr account.  After a second’s debate he added the hashtag  **_#Ur fav would NEVEr #This boy_ ** and posted it.

He rolled onto his side, staring at the screenshot and grinning like a crazy person… and then succumbed to the cold meds, finally.

Steve woke up coughing a short while later, blinking in confusion before realizing that he’d definitely fell asleep on top of his covers, with his damned contacts still in.  He reluctantly moved to the bathroom to pop them out (his eyes were already a sticky, awful mess, so leaving them in absolutely wasn’t worth how he’d feel in the morning), then stumbled back to his bed, groaning when he noticed the time on his alarm clock.

He face-planted back into his pillow, only to bash his nose against the cold, hard surface of his phone.  With a curse he moved the damned thing to his nightstand - then remembered how he’d fell asleep in the first place.  He knocked three books on the floor feeling for his glasses on the nightstand, but finally got them on his nose and pulled his phone screen close to his face, blinking in surprise when he saw his Tumblr app notifications.

With a little red bubble that read  **_1,000+_ ** next to it.

Steve opened the app with shaking fingers, only to laugh out loud when he realized which post it was that had blown up.  He hadn’t imagined the interchange with Bucky, and apparently the entire damned internet was every bit as charmed as he’d felt.  A quick scroll through his inbox confirmed that at least 30 people thought they should get married.

Which… was probably jumping the gun, but was something that Steve couldn’t help preening over, just a little.

**Text to Bucky sent 06:03 AM**

_ I PUT THIS CONVO ON THE INTERNET _

If nothing else, Buck would get a good laugh out of it in the morning, Steve figured with a giggle.

A giggle that stopped as soon as the blue checkmark appeared next to Bucky’s name.

**Text from Bucky received 06:03 AM**

_ hmmmmm? _

Steve - had definitely not expected Buck to be up yet, but he could hardly abandon the conversation now.

**Text to Bucky sent 06:04 AM**

_ I put this on tumblr.  U should see the responses! _

It vaguely occurred to Steve that he probably should have asked for permission ahead of time, but it was Bucky.  And it wasn’t as if he’d said anything terrible - if anything, Steve came out looking like the pervy idiot.

Besides, none of their classmates would guess that this random Bucky on the internet was  _ their  _ Bucky: no one outside of their immediate friend group knew that Buck was such a dork, or would believe it in the first place.

**Text from Bucky received 06:04 AM**

_ is that ur art site? _

Steve hid his grin behind his hand.   _ His _ art site.  Please…

**Text to Bucky sent 06:04 AM**

_ yeah sort of.  i post on it sometimes _

_ it got huge responses! _

_ more than any drawings :P _

_ PS how old r these pjs?  if they r gonna fit me? XD _

**Text from Bucky received 06:04 AM**

_ shit _

Steve’s heart sank in his chest as the ellipse button appeared immediately under Bucky’s response.  He was in the middle of stumbling out of bed to retrieve his laptop to delete the damned thing when his phone chimed again.

**Text from Bucky received 06:05 AM**

_ i lied to millions of ppl on the internet _

_ my mom isnt making me throw my pajamas out _

_ i saw them at target _

Steve was about to laugh and make a snarky reply about the ‘millions’ part (he had a grand total of five hundred twenty-three people following his crappy fan art blog, but Bucky always was one for dramatics) but the rest of Bucky’s rant stopped him cold.

**Text from Bucky received 06:05 AM**

_ they were on sale tho _

_ i know we already did xmas presents _

_ they just made me think of u _

Steve’s smile was so wide his face ached.  The ellipses kept coming.

**Text from Bucky received 06:06 AM**

_ no they werent _

_ they werent on sale  _

_ thats another lie _

_ sorry tumbler _

_ can they see this now??? _

Steve was dying.  Bucky was going to actually kill him with adorableness, and he didn’t even seem to realize it.  After smothering a squeal in his pillow Steve got his shit together and started typing back.

**Text to Bucky sent 06:06AM**

_ nope! no worries ;) _

He gnawed viciously on his bottom lip as he typed up his follow up, started to delete it twice, then finally manned up and hit send.  

Steve was a lot of things, but he sure as hell hoped he wouldn’t ever be called a coward.

**Text to Bucky sent 06:07 AM**

_ i got about 50 message overnight tho _

_ they all say i’ve gotta marry you XD _

The emoticon, Steve decided when he saw the blue checkmark beneath it, was a nice touch.  If Buck freaked out now, he could just laugh the whole thing off as a joke.

(he wasn’t laughing while the ellipse bubble flashed next to Bucky’s name ten billion times in the next two minutes)

**Text from Bucky sent 06:08 AM**

_ we should prob start with coffee first _

_ if ur feeling better i can pick u up tuesday? _

_ is seven okay? _

Steve stared at his phone for a solid thirty seconds, gaping in shock, before pressing the call button next to Bucky’s name with shaking fingers.  Seven was perfect, but he could hardly trust himself to type as much.


	12. Food for the Heart

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Written for the AU prompt: "You're the cutest waiter at my favorite restaurant." 
> 
> Or: Bucky develops a thing for healthy vegan food, that absolutely has nothing to do with the hot waiter who serves him everyday.

Buck was self-aware enough to know that he didn’t exactly fit-in at a place like The Banana Leaf.  The restaurant - a vegan, gluten-aware cafe that specialized in making healthy, Earth-and-allergen conscious food - seemed to cater primarily to hipsters and aging yogis… Bucky never would have stepped foot inside of it had it not been so damned hard to find a place his sister Becca would eat at when she’d finally made the trek from Williamsburg to East Flatbush to visit him over a month since he’d moved back to New York.  Inside was every bit as over-priced and pretentious as Bucky had expected it to be, but he’d bared it all with a smile for the sake of his baby sister.

Then the food arrived, and turned out to be considerably tastier than Buck had ever imagined smoked tempeh and kale chips could be.  And since it was just around the corner from the shitty basement efficiency he was renting while he worked with the VA to get back on his feet didn’t have a kitchen in it, and the fact that the rehab for his arm took enough out of him that adding a gym commitment on top of it was out of the question, Bucky figured that keeping his diet in check was the only hope he had of continuing to fit into his wardrobe.

“Hey Buck,” a pleasant, deep, familiar voice interrupted his thoughts, “good to see ya again; any idea what you wanna order tonight?”  Bucky glanced up as the waiter was speaking, his face immediately breaking into (a very likely ridiculous) smile over the question.  He might have felt embarrassed about it, but Bucky didn’t smile all that often anymore, so he couldn’t bring himself to regret when he did.  

And that was the other reason most of his spending money for the past month had gone to The Banana Leaf: the waiter, Steve.  It could have been because he was looking to continue getting generous tips off of him, but Steve had never once looked oddly at the one-armed, scruffy-faced, haunted-eyed vet who regularly dined with all of the pole-thin artsy crew that were regulars of the cafe.  Then again, at first glance, Steve didn’t exactly seem to fit in, either: sure, his shaggy blond undercut and plastic-rimmed glasses were standard enough, but the guy was more jacked than Bucky had been at his fittest as a Ranger.  And he made a habit of wearing his restaurant-issue polos at least a size and a half too small, much to Bucky’s appreciation.

“The special is a tofishy sandwich with yucca fries,” Steve continued, seemingly unbothered by Bucky’s lack of response - he shook himself, trying not to think about how long he’d been staring aimlessly at the guy.  “In case you were interested.”

“Uh, thanks,” Bucky murmured, picking up the menu in front of him and looking over the options at a breakneck pace.  He’d already decided on his order, before, but as usual he was so flustered by the practical Adonis in front of him that he couldn’t remember what it had been.  “I think I’m gonna try the jerk tofu, tonight,” he finally answered, picking an item at random.

He was pretty sure he’d had the entire menu at that point, all by the same random, panicked method.

“Awesome, that’s one of my favorites,” Steve beamed, the same as he usually did, waiting for Bucky to set the menu down on the table to close it before handing it over.  

He’d never once reached across the table or offered to close it for Bucky, no matter how frustrating it must have been to watch him fumble the thing one-handedly.  Bucky might have fallen in love with him, just for that fact.

They both smiled at one another for a few seconds, each holding opposite ends of the menu, before Bucky finally relinquished his hold on the laminated paper and Steve retreated towards the kitchen with an awkward nod.  In the minutes that followed, Bucky did his best to regain his cool, scrolling through his facebook feed and trying to ignore the feeling that the other diners were looking at him - his therapist had told him time and time again that the paranoia was a combination of unresolved hypervigilance from being at war and unfounded self-consciousness about his physical appearance and injuries.  Logically, Bucky knew that he was nothing to look at, and had nothing to worry about, sitting in a perfectly safe hipster cafe in the middle of his home town.  His brain, on the other hand…

Once again, he was interrupted before his thoughts could spiral too far down the dark path they were headed towards.  “Here we go,” Steve murmured, setting down a heaping plate of cubes in brown sauce: while the tofu looked anything but appetizing, the smell of the jerk seasoning made Bucky’s mouth water immediately.  “Jerk tofu with rice and veg.”

Bucky glanced up at him with a crooked smile, pausing as he reached for his silverware when he realized that Steve was holding a second plate of something on a bun.

“Uh,” Steve continued, blushing furiously as he followed Bucky’s eyes towards the plate.  “I’m actually starting my break - I was thinking I might join you.  If that’s okay…”

“Yeah,” Bucky responded immediately, totally dumbfounded by the look of relief that immediately spread across Steve’s face.  “Yeah, of course, that’d be awesome.”

He’d hardly finished his response before Steve had dropped the second plate across the table and stripped out of the green apron he wore for serving, dropping into the seat with a wide grin.   “Ya know,” he admitted after a couple of seconds, “I hope it’s not too weird, but I’ve been waiting on this for a while.”

Bucky nodded stupidly, trying his best to ignore the squirming feeling of hope in his stomach, along with the feeling that this impromptu dinner was somehow a  _ date _ of all things.  Steve’s words finally started to resonate as he stabbed his first brick of tofu, though, and Bucky couldn’t help but reason that Steve was admitting to the same thing: that he’d been waiting to share a dinner all this time, too.

“It ain’t weird at all,” he finally said with a grin, pausing to take his first bite (and thoroughly enjoy it, despite the texture).  “Or… it’s mutual, at least.”  He added after swallowing, unable to miss the way that Steve’s eyes watched his throat all the while.

It sent a thrill down Bucky’s spine - a sense of hope and excitement that he hadn’t imagined himself capable of feeling again after his injury.  But he reveled in it as Steve returned his smile and took a bite of his own meal.

The healthy vegan hipster food was entirely worth it.


	13. Plus One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Written for the AU prompt "I don't want to go to my ex's wedding alone and our mutual friend says your free for the night."

There was no way in hell that Steve was missing Peggy’s wedding.

It was a decision that he’d made the second that he’d gotten the ecstatic text from Peg that Angie had popped the question, one that he had zero intention on even considering going back on: for as weird as their history had been, Peggy was still one of Steve’s dearest friends, and he loved her dearly.  However, now that he had the actual, physical invitation in-hand, it… complicated things.  Because all of their friends and family knew full-well about their history, about how crazy Steve had been about Peggy when they had dated an entire lifetime ago.  And while anyone that mattered  _ also _ knew that it had been a completely amicable, mutually healthy split when they had called it off, Steve still felt like it would be awkward, showing up as one of the brides’ exes. 

Especially when he had no one to fill in as his plus one - if he could at least show up with a date, Steve knew he might be able to save face, to chuckle and comfortably assure anyone who seemed skeptical that he and the former love of his life really were both better off as friends.

If he showed up single, though, it would just look sad.  And Steve, being Steve, didn’t exactly have people lining up to date him.

He might have asked a friend to have gone along with: Natasha would look killer in a cocktail dress and regularly seemed to have Steve’s back since they’d started working together, but she’d already planned a weekend away with Clint before Steve had gotten up the nerve to ask her.  Of course, the one weekend of the year that she took for herself would fall on the weekend of Peggy’s wedding… in the end Steve didn’t even end up mentioning his dilemma around her.

Riley’s parents were in town that same week, meaning Sam couldn’t join him either, much to Steve’s consternation.  And Thor was heading home for the month, Sharon would already be taking Maria (and was likely in the wedding party, now that he thought about it), and Tony, well.  Steve loved Tony as a friend, but he could only imagine how uncomfortable he would wind up making the entire ex's wedding situation: Steve wasn’t  _ that _ desperate for a date.

“Just ask Bucky,” Sam huffed one morning during their run, apparently tired of listening to Steve’s wedding woes.  He couldn’t exactly blame Sam for snapping: Steve had been grousing about his shit luck for the better part of a mile, but he also couldn’t find it in himself to feel guilty about it.  After all, RSVPs were due within the week, and he could only deflect Peggy’s reminder texts for so long.

“I couldn’t,” Steve responded immediately, “he and Peg…”

“Got along just fine,” Sam interrupted, glancing out of the side of his eye at Steve.  “Every time I’ve seen them together, it’s obvious they respect the hell out of each other.  And it’s not like you haven’t taken Bucky to important shit like this before.”

“I know,” Steve absolutely did not whine, “but you didn’t see them when I was dating Peggy.  Buck would get - real weird about it, sometimes.  I don’t want to make either of them uncomfortable.”

His hearing might have been shit in his right ear, but Steve definitely heard Sam mutter “can’t imagine why,” under his breath in the middle of Steve’s statement.  He decided to pretend like he hadn’t.   

By the end of the run, Steve’s already on his way to having a change of heart.  Because while he still stands by his worry about things being awkward between his two best friends, Sam had a point: Bucky would almost certainly be willing to pose as Steve’s date, and he really seemed to be the only one of his friends who would be available that weekend to do so.  While he didn’t want to put anyone in an uncomfortable position… Steve  _ really _ didn’t want to show up at the wedding alone.

It took another solid twenty-four hours of worrying, but in the end Steve ended up texting Bucky to meet him for a drink, trying his best to act natural as he waited at their usual bar.

“Hey,” Bucky greeted with a smile, waving when Steve looked up from his phone and climbing onto the barstool next to him.  “How’re things goin’?  Is anyone else joining us?”

“Things are okay,” Steve lied, turning his phone over and trying his best to ignore how well Bucky’s henley fit his shoulders.  “And, uh… no, just us for a change.  I figured it’s been awhile since we’ve been able to catch up, just the two of us.”

“Way too long,” Bucky agreed, signaling the bartender for a beer and scooting minutely closer to Steve’s side.

They spent the better part of half an hour making small-talk about work and baseball and their other friends, before Steve finally forced himself to cut to the chase.  “Alright, listen - I’ve gotta confess, I didn’t really invite you out just to hang out,” he started, wincing at the confused frown that Bucky gave him.  “I mean, I wanted to hang out, but I wanted to ask a favor, too.”

“Alright…” Bucky responded with a half a smile, “what’s up?”

Steve sighed, draining the rest of his beer as he gathered up his wits and finally blurted out, “Will you go to Peggy’s wedding with me?”

“Yeah, sure,” Bucky responded immediately, watching Steve closely with a look of confusion.  “Wait, was that it?”

“I mean,” Steve blinked, immediately feeling stupid, “yeah, I guess so.  I’d asked a couple other people cuz but they were all busy, so you don’t gotta go if you don’t want to, I just really wanted someone to go with and I figured…”

“Steve,” Bucky laughed, interrupting him, “I already said yes.  What weekend is it?”

“The second in May,” Steve answered, relaxing slightly in his seat.  “But I need to get them my RSVP in the next couple days.”

Bucky flipped through the calendar app on his phone, smirking as he clicked away.  “Sounds good, I’ll have steak if they’re doing the plated dinner thing.  Ang get her way on the venue?”

“I’m not sure,” Steve answered, still feeling waves of relief over how cool Bucky was acting about the whole thing, “I mean, it’s gonna be in London, so I guess.”

“Alright then, just let me know the details when you got ‘em,” Bucky said, setting his phone back down on the bar.  “Although I gotta ask - if I’m going to be spending the night as your platonic date, can I at least count on getting a dance out of it?”

“Buck,” Steve groaned, pushing his empty beer glass away, “you know I don’t dance.”  Especially not in small venues, around people he used to know as Peggy’s boyfriend. 

“Yeah, yeah, I know… the ‘right partner’ schtick,” Bucky sighed, shrugging nonchalantly.  To anyone else he probably looked chill, but Steve had known him for his entire life, and he definitely didn’t miss the flash of disappointment in Bucky’s eyes.  “Just figured it was worth an ask.”

Steve was still too hung up on that look to answer immediately, it didn’t make sense for Bucky to be bummed about dancing with Steve: there would be plenty of strangers there who Steve was sure would be more than happy to take a spin with a guy like Bucky, and it wasn’t as if Steve was saying he wasn’t allowed to dance at all.

Unless… unless he actually  _ wanted _ to dance with Steve.

Despite his initial plans for the night, Steve signaled for the bartender and ordered them each another round; he had to work in the morning, yeah, but he also needed some help processing what the hell had just happened.  

They both sipped at their new drinks in silence, half-watching the hockey game that was playing on the TV behind the bar.  Steve was talking again before he had time to really think about what he was saying.  

“We’ll see.”  His voice was considerably more loud than he’d been planning.  Bucky raised his eyebrows dramatically over the rim of his pint glass, obviously lost on what the hell Steve was talking about.

“I mean, about the dancing thing.  Maybe we can work on it or somethin’, we’ve got a couple months.  We’ll see how it goes.”  Afterall, it would look weird for him to blow off his date all night, and dancing could be any easy way to be intimate without it getting too weird for either of them.

Plus, his agreement meant Bucky gave Steve that excited little grin that always made his stomach dip when he lowered his drink and asked, “Really?”

Steve just shrugged and smiled back, silently answering that it wasn’t that big a deal.  They spent the next hour chatting idly again, although the air between them felt considerably lighter than it had prior to Steve’s agreement.  After settling the tab they parted for the night with a brief hug and a promise to hang out again soon, as was their usual (as if they didn’t see each other at least a couple days a week, anyway).

It wasn’t until Steve was home and settling in for bed that he really revisited the dancing conversation again, when his mind supplied him with the image of Bucky in one of his nicer suits, all fancied up and properly asking Steve to dance.  Steve frowned and shook his head to clear it, trying his best to ignore the hot, excited feeling it ignited in his chest.

Bucky was his friend, Steve’s best friend if he was being honest, and he was coming along to play his date as a favor; it was that simple.  It made perfect sense.  

It took a couple hours of Steve repeating that mantra before he could finally fall into a fitful sleep, stomping down the mean little voice at the back of his mind telling him he’d made a huge mistake.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not saying I'm planning on writing a sequel for this ficlet set at the wedding, but... don't be surprised when there's a sequel to this ficlet set at the wedding.


	14. The Wedding (Plus One pt 2)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is a continuation of the last chapter, where Steve asks Bucky to come to Peggy's wedding with him because he doesn't want to go alone. Things happen.

In the weeks leading up to the wedding, Steve was infinitely glad that he’d finally gotten up the nerve to ask Bucky to come as his ‘date’ - not only because of the relief he felt when he’d been able to check off the _plus one_ box on his RSVP and save face, but because it turned out that planning an international trip in such a short amount of time (even one that had been planned as meticulously as Peggy Carter could) was ridiculously stressful work.  Steve wasn’t sure he’d have gotten through all of it with his sanity intact, if not for Bucky’s help.

As it was, they had their flights scheduled and were both able to get a few extra days off of work to allow themselves time to do independent sightseeing around the city.  Initially they’d had trouble figuring out how to fill said days without being completely pathetic tourists, but luckily Steve had been able to find time for drinks with Peggy one evening after work, who was so thrilled to hear that he was _FINALLY_ owning up to his feelings about Bucky (the way she’d gushed when Steve had admitted the identity of his date had been all kinds of uncomfortable, considering how subtle he thought his feelings for his friend were) that she was all-too-happy to give them an itinerary of things to do together.  Steve tried his best to ignore how many times she mentioned Angie during the list… not because he had any problems with his ex’s fiance, of course, but because he didn’t want to psyche himself out too much when it came to riding the London Eye with Bucky.  

Just because Peggy said it made for a great date afternoon, didn’t mean that they couldn’t enjoy the hell out of it as friends.

As the date drew closer, Steve was half-afraid that he should suggest they spend time acting as a couple, to make the whole facade more natural when they were put on the spot; as it was they were spending so much time together anyway, making plans and just hanging out as they always had (and on one regrettable night, practicing dance moves at Bucky’s insistence) that it hardly seemed necessary.  God knew that they were together just as often as any other busy, employed Millennial couple were, and they’d known each other for so long that it wasn’t as if someone would be able to quiz them and call their bluff on the act.  Plus, weren’t people supposed to date their best friends, anyway?  If anything, Steve figured that Bucky was the best he could ask for in a pretend date, outside of maybe Peggy herself.

He was getting really good at ignoring the voice that reminded him how much he wished it wasn’t pretend, too.

Before he knew it, the week of the wedding had arrived, and found the two of them waiting outside the gate for their flight, listening to podcasts on their phones as they passed the time.  They’d been ridiculously early to arrive at the airport - but having never flown internationally before Steve had wanted to give plenty of time to get through security and find their gate, and being an incredible friend, Bucky had put up with him.  Thankfully their luggage and passports had been approved without issue, which left Steve with a solid hour to worry about their bags being lost or embarrassing himself at the wedding, or the trip turning into a disaster, or their suits not showing up at their hotel as ordered... 

He didn’t even realize how much he’d worked himself up until a solid, warm arm had snaked its way around his shoulders and pulled him into a sideways hug.  Steve blinked in surprise, feeling the tension ease out of his muscles as he turned his head towards Bucky - who went right on reading the battered paperback in his free hand, as if nothing had happened.  As if it were perfectly normal for him to just hold Steve until he calmed down.

Honestly, it wasn’t _that_ uncommon; Bucky had been a tactile guy for as long as Steve had known him.  But something about the way he left his arm around Steve’s thin shoulders, and the gentle way that his thumb moved back and forth, mindlessly over the point of Steve’s shoulder, somehow felt different.  And while it kept him from completely freaking out before their boarding announcement was finally made, it also scared the hell out of him, for entirely different reasons.

Thankfully, the flight had gone without problems, and landed them in London exactly as planned, with all of their luggage intact.  Even better, they’d been able to get a ride from Heathrow relatively easily, and arrived at their hotel to find the suits that they’d ordered and had fitted in New York already waiting for them.  It almost made Steve nervous all over again; he worried about just how far he’d be able to press his luck before it ran out.  

His question was answered as soon as they’d opened the door to their room.  It made sense, given the fact that they’d told Peggy they were coming to her wedding as a couple, that the room she’d book for them in the wedding party’s block of hotel suites would be one with a single king bed in it, but that didn’t make the idea of sleeping with his best friend for an entire week any less daunting.

Bucky, of course, found it hilarious.  

“I mean, we _did_ ask for it, didn’t we?”  He chuckled, already turning and making his way past Steve back to the tiny sitting room they’d walked through.  “It’s no big deal, I’m sure the couch pulls out…”

“No,” Steve responded immediately, surprising them both when he caught Bucky by the elbow.  For as hard as his heart was pounding in his chest, his voice sounded remarkably certain.  “No, that’s stupid.  The bed’s huge, there’s no reason we can’t just share it.”

“It’s not a big deal -” Bucky countered.

“I know,” Steve interrupted, jutting his chin out in warning.  “It’ll be like old times, right?  Which side d’ya want?”

There was a moment where something weird flashed across Bucky’s face, but it passed so quickly that Steve decided to pretend like he hadn’t noticed it, and instead started setting his luggage up the way he wanted in the closet on the opposite side of the room. 

For as uncomfortable as that initial sleeping discussion was, the rest of the week went surprisingly well.  They met up with Ang and Peggy for dinner at an incredible restaurant overlooking Hyde Park on their second night in the city, and spent the rest of their time sightseeing - touring palaces and the Tower of London, wandering through the National Gallery of art and even catching a play at a smaller theatre just outside of the West End.  It was so easy and comfortable, wandering around the city with Bucky, taking in the incredible sights and comparing and contrasting them to all of the similar experiences they’d shared in New York over the years.  Buck, for his part, seemed to be enjoying it just as much as Steve - his excitement was so infectious that even the selfies that he swore on getting of the two of them together at each of their stops didn’t even annoy Steve, despite how much he usually hated having his picture taken.

The way they looked didn’t even occur to him until an older couple on the London Eye offered to take their picture, after having inevitably heard Bucky bemoaning how hard it was to get a shot of the two of them that really captured the view.  “A couple as handsome as yourselves deserves a full-body shot, anyway,” she said with shrewd smile, beaming as she made her way back to her husband while Steve and Bucky gaped at her like idiots.

It wasn’t until the champagne got passed around at the very top that Steve realized that they’d booked a couples’ trip on the famous wheel.  He tried his best to hide his embarrassment in his champagne fluke, and told himself for the rest of the ride that they were obviously getting good practice.  It helped him ignore all of the kissing couples around them and how badly he wanted Bucky to suggest that they give into peer pressure.  (Unfortunately, Buck was suddenly way too busy taking photos of the view and uploading selfies to instagram.  Steve convinced himself it was for the better - with the wedding being the next night, it wouldn’t do well to make things weird, now)

The day of the wedding broke sunny and bright, hardly what Steve had expected when Peggy had decided on a winter wedding in London.  All the same, he couldn’t help feeling happy for her - she and Angie both deserved as much, and Steve was beyond glad that he could be there for their big day.  Even if it meant waking up in a warm, sunkissed room with his best friend wrapped around him like an octopus.

Luckily, Steve was able to get out of Bucky’s hold before he woke up, and they were able to spend their morning getting ready without the additional awkwardness between them.  Everything was going great, Steve thought - his suit fit him well, his cowlick actually cooperated when he gelled his hair into place, and it looked as though they’d be ready with more than enough time to catch the first shuttle from the hotel to the church.  And then Bucky walked out of the bathroom, and Steve forgot how to breathe.

They’d never been able to match their schedules up well-enough to have gone suit shopping together in New York, so Steve had just told Bucky his planned colors and figured no one would exactly be expecting them to match, anyway.  Steve’s suit was a slate grey, with a pearl shirt and navy blue silk tie that the sales clerk who’d helped him that day swore brought out his eyes.  Bucky’s suit was at least a shade darker, and the same color as his shirt and tie.  The ensemble might have been too dark and monotone, if Bucky didn’t still have the jacket open, revealing the bright blue silk lining inside.  Between the way he’d slicked his hair back and the dark colors and cut of the suit, it made his cheekbones and jaw look even sharper than normal, and his shoulders impossibly broader.

The only coherent thought that Steve had as he looked at him was that this was a BAD. IDEA.

(the rest of his panicked mind completely blocked out the shell-shocked look that Bucky’d had when he caught a glimpse of Steve, too)

“You look good,” Bucky croaked, breaking the awkward silence an eternity later.  

“Yeah,” Steve muttered stupidly, “Yeah, you do, too.  We should prolly go.”

And just like that they were back to acting normal.  The ride to the church was short, and once they arrived they both were kept busy with catching up with other friends in attendance and introducing themselves to the family members that they didn’t recognize.  The service was small enough that it wasn’t long before they were seated for the wedding party, and the brides finally made their way down the aisle.  Angie was gorgeous, looking like an angel in floaty white tulle with her blonde hair piled on her head.  Peggy, of course, was equally beautiful in a form-fitting vintage dress, with her usual curls and matte red lipstick.  

They both cried when they saw one another, and looked so blissfully happy that Steve couldn’t quite help but tear up as well - mostly out of happiness.  It wasn’t so much that he wanted to take Angie’s place… he knew that she was better for Peggy, that the two of them were well-suited as friends.  But at the same time, he couldn’t help but wish that someone would look at him the way they looked at one another when they took hands in front of the alter.

The fact that Bucky looked a little misty when he pressed his shoulder against Steve’s helped, weirdly enough.

That gentle touch remained throughout the service, keeping Steve grounded as the women said their vows and kissed, and then the church practically erupted with joy as they spilled out into the reception hall.  

The ceremony being over helped, as did the food and the booze and the relaxed atmosphere of all of the party goers.  Steve was able to give the happy couple a hug and his congratulations, then stammer his thanks as they both oohed and ahhed over how well his suit fit and how good Bucky looked and how adorable their instagram had been over the week, a theme that seemed to carry through the night.  Once the dinner plates had been cleared and toasts had been made, and Peggy and Angie had their first dance as a couple, the music picked up - and Bucky left Steve’s side for the first time all week.

Steve did his best not to mope, instead watching with a smile as he sipped his drink and watched Bucky charm Sharon, and then both Peggy and Angie and half of the other ladies present with a dance.  Steve couldn’t begrudge him for it; Buck always had been the life of a party, and it wasn’t like Steve could blame women for wanting to dance with him.

He lost track of time, and had no idea how many songs passed before someone was dropping into the chair next to him.  Bucky grinned before taking a long drink from the glass of water he’d left behind, while Steve tried not to get too interested in the stray curl of hair that had escaped his gel and flopped over onto his forehead.

“So,” Bucky finally said once his glass was empty, leaning in and speaking up over the bass of the pop song that was blaring from the dance floor.  “Am I getting that dance tonight, Rogers?  We _do_ have appearances to keep up.”

Between his hair and the devilish little smile Bucky gave him, and the liquid courage that Steve had built up throughout the course of the night, he surprised even himself by rising out of his chair and holding his hand out to Bucky.  “We came all this way, I suppose I owe you _something_ ,” he answered, his smile and tone completely negating the peevish words.

Bucky was out of his chair like a shot, and practically dragged Steve to the dance floor, as if he was afraid that he’d end up changing his mind.  Of course, as soon as they found a spot, the song changed, fading from the frantic beat of the dance song to a [soft, melancholy piano intro.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=npwHNcGqueE)

“Er,” Bucky started, color rising on his cheeks as he looked down at Steve questioningly.

Steve caught Peggy giving him a huge smile, spinning Angie so that she could give him a ridiculous double thumbs up, and realized that he could hardly chicken out now.  He stepped in closer to Bucky, taking hold of his left hand and sliding his right around the small of his back, until they were pressed gently against one another.  “You’re not gonna punk out on me now, are ya?”  Steve teased, resting his face against the lapel of Bucky’s jacket, so that he’d miss the look on his face if Bucky decided to turn him down, now.

_Wise men say_ , the singer’s voice began.

“Nah,” Bucky responded quietly, wrapping his own arm around Steve’s back and beginning to sway to the music.   “Not a chance I’m blowin’ this one.”

The latter was said softly enough that Steve barely heard it over the words _Only fools rush in_.

_But I can’t help falling in love with you_.

Steve tried his best to relax as the song went on, to focus on avoiding Bucky’s toes and trying his best not to look like an idiot, but it was hard to pay attention to much other than the heat radiating off of Bucky’s chest, or the careful, perfect way that they swayed back and forth to the ridiculously cliche music.  Steve never lifted his face off of Bucky’s jacket, terrified of what his friend would see on his face if he dared to look at him: because it was true.  The past week, the months of planning leading up to it, the years of friendship when they’d both undoubtedly been the most important person in each other’s lives… how could he _not_ have fallen for Bucky Barnes?  If he was honest with himself, Steve knew that he’d probably been in love with Bucky since before he’d ever really known what love was.

And now here he was, surrounded by happy people and love and romance, and _pretending_ like he was dating the love of his life.  Because Steve was a fucking idiot.

_Like a river flows surely to the sea_  
_Darling so it goes, some things are meant to be_

Steve almost cut their dance off, realizing that he was reaching his limit for punishment (a threshold he’d honestly never thought he’d reach), but when he looked up at Bucky he found himself so shocked that he was unable to do anything but continue swaying to the music.  Because Bucky was staring down at him with a look Steve had never saw before - a look that was so open and raw and, dare he hope, lovesick, that he couldn’t step away from it.  

A look that perfectly captured everything that Steve was feeling.

_Take my hand, take my whole life too_  
_Oh for I can’t help falling in love with you_

“Stevie?” Bucky whispered, his voice barely a rasp over the music and yet still the only thing that Steve could hear.  He didn’t say anything else, but then he didn’t need to.  Steve knew all too well what he was asking, and he was more than happy to comply.

He surged up on his toes at the same time that Bucky ducked his head, pressing their mouths together in a chaste but fierce kiss.  Steve had no idea how long they stayed locked together like that, but he didn’t care, either.  When their lips finally parted he pulled Bucky back to him, stealing a couple of quick pecks as Bucky huffed in surprise but returned all the same.

They were both flushed when they looked at each other again, panting slightly from the rush and length of the kiss.  After a few seconds of stunned silence, Steve felt a grin split across his face that was so wide it hurt - Bucky was grinning like a dopey idiot right back at him.  

At some point the song changed, but neither of them particularly paid attention: they just continued swaying together on their own corner of the dance floor, making out in their own obliviously happy little bubble.

Across the dance floor the brides exchanged a high five as they giggled at their once-hopeless friends, ecstatic that their plan had worked, before taking a cue from the boys and sharing a snog of their own.

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on tumblr if you want to see me yell about Sebastian Stan and most things Marvel... http://0n-y0ur-left.tumblr.com/


End file.
